Class floors and ceilings


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.

As I discussed in another thread, I'm starting to realize how much more of a balancing point the floor, or worst a class can be, is important to balance, far more than the ceiling, or best a class can be. I'd like to discuss this with others though and get some more opinions on it. To give the examples I gave in the other thread in a 1 to 10 scale, with 1 being "barely functions as intended if at all", 5 being "functions well as intended", and 10 being "functions too well and breaks balance."

Barbarian: 2 to 5
Bard: 2 to 6
Clerics: high 2 to 9
Druid: 3 to 9
Fighter: low 1 to 4
Monk: low 1 to 4
Paladin: 2 to 5
Ranger: 2 to 5
Rogue: low 1 to 3
Sorcerer: low 2 to 9
Wizard: high 1 to 10

Alchemist: high 2-6
Cavalier: 2-4
Gunslinger: 2-4
Inquisitor: high 2-6
Magus: low 2-6
Oracle: 2-9
Summoner: 4-8
Unbarbarian: 2-4
Unmonk: low 1-4
Unrogue: low 1-4
Unsummoner: 3-8
Witch: 2-8

I myself think probably the best point for the game to be played is from 3-6, still on the lower end, but before we get to anything too intense. It's a place where the lower end of classes need a bit of optimization to stay relevant, but everyone is still feasibly playing the same game. Post 6 is getting into the fullcaster's realm, where tricks to instantly end encounters and more exploty things are relevant. I'd love to see others opinions on the ideas of class floors and ceilings.


What class level are you assuming for these numbers? It could severely sway your numbers.

Silver Crusade

Ciaran Barnes wrote:
What class level are you assuming for these numbers? It could severely sway your numbers.

I oddly enough mentioned that in the original post, but this is more of a 1-20 estimation. I agree that as the classes level, the gaps grow, and it could be possible to make a floor/ceiling for each tier of play (1-5, 5-10, 10-15, 15-20), although this is more of a general floor/ceiling comparison.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

You have it backwards, floor is the minimum, ceiling is the maximum.

Only the maximum is important for balance.

Here is a series of good articles on balance.
http://www.sirlin.net/articles/balancing-multiplayer-games-part-1-definitio ns


Quote:
how much more of a balancing point the ceiling, or worst a class can be, is important to balance, far more than the ceiling, or best a class can be.

I think you mean "Floor" for the first one

Silver Crusade

CWheezy wrote:

You have it backwards, floor is the minimum, ceiling is the maximum.

Only the maximum is important for balance.

Here is a series of good articles on balance.
http://www.sirlin.net/articles/balancing-multiplayer-games-part-1-definitio ns

Normally I'd agree with you, the ceiling should be the balancing point, but that only works when most people are playing close to the ceiling. In PF, I find a lot of people playing closer to the floor, although I suppose I should have prefaced this with that the 'floor argument' being PF exclusive in that regard.

Snowblind wrote:
Quote:
how much more of a balancing point the ceiling, or worst a class can be, is important to balance, far more than the ceiling, or best a class can be.
I think you mean "Floor" for the first one

I...may have messed that up, yes.


Not sure what you're looking for here. It's a topic I think about from time to time, and it's something good to know if you're the GM of an inexperienced group or otherwise in a position of guidance but uh...what else is there to say?

Given that the 1-10 scale is just a bunch of numbers you made up and shows classes only relative to each other, I think it's fair to summarize the table thusly: "Everyone can be terrible, except Summoners and Druids. Only 6+ level casters will be able to be gamebreakingly good."

Dark Archive

I think Unchained Rogue has a higher floor (2). It's very easy for a new player to say "Oh, I'm a thief, I want to have high Dex and pick a light weapon for finesse training." And just like that you have plenty of combat power and plenty of out-of-combat utility for your party.


You offer an interesting thought experiment, but perhaps instead of true floor, you should look at unoptimized build vice truly abysmal builds. How bad a class can be without deliberately making it so. Sure you could dump INT as a wizard and loose access to all spell casting, BUT is that actually a problem people deal with in their games? You have to assume at least a minor amount of competency.


I think Fighter being a low 1 and a Wizard being a high 1 on the floorside reflects "at least a minor amount of competency". A 7 int wizard should by all rights be a low 1, given that all they have is a familiar and scribe scroll.

Shadow Lodge

I'm assuming the "floor" represent the worst build that a person completely ignorant of the rules is likely to come up with, rather than the worst build that someone can make by intentionally trying to make a terrible character. Any class can be pretty much nonfunctional if you build it to be (even the summoner, if you intentionally build a terrible eidolon).

In that respect, I think the floor on Barbarians and Paladins should be 3, and the druid should be 2. In my experience pretty much any Barbarian or Paladin with a melee weapon and class-appropriate armour is at least moderately effective, while druids can be a little trickier if you don't understand how polymorphing works, don't select the right spells, and/or don't properly prioritize your casting and fighting abilities.


I think the level is very important. Levels 16-20 see the least amount of actual table play, while levels 1-5 see the most. Or, thats my experience anyhow. The majority of my characters begin at level 1, and I have worked my up to level 18 only once. Ratings that favor the least played levels (as I feel these do) are useful to fewer players. At levels 1-5 the capabilities of each class are more closely matched, which is probably a big factor in the arguments that crop up about tiers, weak classes, etc.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Jaunt wrote:
I think Fighter being a low 1 and a Wizard being a high 1 on the floorside reflects "at least a minor amount of competency". A 7 int wizard should by all rights be a low 1, given that all they have is a familiar and scribe scroll.

You kind of have to, though.

Otherwise everyone would be about a low -10, because they all suck when they go around bull-rushing things without the feats. The whole comparison becomes pointless.

For the analysis to be useful, "Floor" needs to be less "absolute worst you could possibly make" and more "low end of what a new player is likely to slap together".


Snowblind wrote:


You kind of have to, though.

Otherwise everyone would be about a low -10, because they all suck when they go around bull-rushing things without the feats. The whole comparison becomes pointless.

For the analysis to be useful, "Floor" needs to be less "absolute worst you could possibly make" and more "low end of what a new player is likely to slap together".

I absolutely agree. All I'm saying is that I think Jolly's table reflects "low end of what a new player might make", despite him saying it's the "worst a class can be".


I can see a wizard with good int still being a high 1 on the scale. It's a poor selection of spells and a bad timing for using them that can make a wizard fail miserably to achieve anything close to their potential.

Also if he's looking at power across the whole scale, let's face it, that first level of praying you don't roll *another* one on your acid splash damage really does suck.


@CWheezy: I think that article is more focused on compentetive multiplayer where players' primary intrest is to push the ceiling. While pushing the ceiling in Pathfinder means that the roof will actually rise (the DM will adjusts the game).

I've started to lose interest in top tier characters, not only from a flavour point of view but because the only thing that changes is that we're dealing with higher numbers. And it's boring to "limit" the group to only top tier builds, otherwise someone falls behind.
In that sense it's more important with the floor, as we need to make sure that someone's isn't too low.

Silver Crusade

Jaunt wrote:

Not sure what you're looking for here. It's a topic I think about from time to time, and it's something good to know if you're the GM of an inexperienced group or otherwise in a position of guidance but uh...what else is there to say?

Given that the 1-10 scale is just a bunch of numbers you made up and shows classes only relative to each other, I think it's fair to summarize the table thusly: "Everyone can be terrible, except Summoners and Druids. Only 6+ level casters will be able to be gamebreakingly good."

I'd say the thing to talk about here doesn't really stem from the older classes, but moreso the newer ones, and the design that goes behind them. It's why I added the APG/UC/UM classes too, to give an idea of where future floors and ceilings were going, although including the floors and ceilings of the ACG probably would have been helpful too.

To me, the summoner starting at a 4 is what makes it 'broken' for a lot of groups, it's an easy to optimize class that comes with a lot of innate power.

And yeah, it is a scale I made up, I'm not sure the point of mentioning that, I stated it was an opinion trying to judge the classes relative to each other. I think part of the discussion stems from what floor is the best? I mean I'd say the TOB classes were around a 3 for their floor, which is what made them seem broken, but in comparison to a somewhat system savvy 6th level caster, they were fine.

Also if having a low floor is a problem for classes like the fighter and rogue, as well as a low ceiling, which is partially their issues. They can't grow even with a great deal of system mastery, at least beyond their basic confines. That's kind of what I'm looking to discuss here.


Its actually pretty on point for pathfinder.

Pathfinder is called a cooperative game but for combat it mostly is not? its the players vs the monsters, which is being run by the dm, so it is the players vs the dm.

It doesn't actually matter how many people are playing close to the ceiling, for balance purposes. What matters is what the game at the ceiling is like. For pathfinder, it is probably the most broken game I have ever played? There is a tier for mortals, and a tier for gods, it is that bad, lol.


In that case, I'd say that the new classes are much like the old classes. I'd say most of them floor around two, and ceiling at 8, tops. Most much lower.

Agreed on the Summoner getting a bad rap because of the high floor. I'm one of many who've been banging that drum for a while.

My point in bringing up your subjective scale is that we might have more interesting things to say if we tied the scale to some kind of meaningful benchmarks. I dunno, maybe not. But what I was saying is that it's the lack of benchmarks that allow me to make a very high level generalization of your table.

Definitely agreed that classes having low floors contributes to their being bad, but when you consider that great classes also have low floors (and generally, everyone but Summoners and Druids and the TOB classes) I don't think it's too terribly meaningful.

What I'm getting at is that if you buffed Rogues to be a solid 3, then they'd have a niche...but only in inexperienced groups. If Paizo made the floor of bad classes higher, you'd have two possible outcomes. First, everyone would be decent in low optimization groups, but in every other game, things would be the same. And then we'd have a bunch of people crying on the boards that Rogues are super OP, and people on the other hand crying that Rogues are terrible, and they'd both be right but they'd be bickering constantly. It'd be even more annoying. And you'd be teaching people things in rookie games that they then have to unlearn if they want to later fit in with more highly optimized games. That already happens to some extent, but it'd be worse.

I think the more meaningful change would be increasing the ceiling for everyone who cuts out before 6. Or rein in (ever so slightly) the casters sitting at 9+. Any fundamental change that increased a class's ceiling will probably have the side effect of increasing its floor (and vice versa), but sadly, any probable power increases will be done through archetypes and feats, which will increase ceilings but not floors.


The only complaint I have (other than the fact you probably need to go 1-20 just so you can distinguish between high 1 and low 1) is that I think Cleric needs to be bumped up to 3. While it's entirely possible to screw up a cleric, most of their power (like all full casters) comes from spells. And a cleric literally cannot screw up spells. They can screw up their selection for the day but while a wizard has to go buy scrolls to make up for bad spell choices a cleric just waits a day and asks their god for the right set of spells. You cannot, no matter how hard you try, screw up your access to "Ultimate Power"™.


So, I feel like you've hit on an important point. The most important thing, for balance, is to make sure that the characters are even with the other characters. You can always, and easily, add/subtract monsters.

I wonder if we need a handicap system like golf, or a gentleman's agreement to keep balance close.

Silver Crusade

Jaunt wrote:

Agreed on the Summoner getting a bad rap because of the high floor. I'm one of many who've been banging that drum for a while.

My point in bringing up your subjective scale is that we might have more interesting things to say if we tied the scale to some kind of meaningful benchmarks. I dunno, maybe not. But what I was saying is that it's the lack of benchmarks that allow me to make a very high level generalization of your table.

Definitely agreed that classes having low floors contributes to their being bad, but when you consider that great classes also have low floors (and generally, everyone but Summoners and Druids and the TOB classes) I don't think it's too terribly meaningful.

Something I'd say here is perhaps calling a 1 a paizo build NPC for the most part (we can all agree the NPCs aren't built for power), while a 5 is going to be in the range of Invul Rager superstitious Barbarian built by someone with more of a mind for power.

5 for caster would probably be more in line with a strong built support bard, or a moderately optimized druid. I'm honestly up for any discussions on what would make a better benchmark though.

Me personally, I think 6 is as high as the game should go, and in some ways, new design is working for a lower ceiling in how the witch falls below wizard. Ideally, 6 would be the highest ceiling, something very powerful but not game destroying. For me, once you go past 6, which for this conversation I would say would be a top end Beastmorph Vivi Alchemist or heavily optimized Empiricist Investigator, you're going beyond what the system should allow.

Beyond 6 to me would be some of the more dangerous summoner tricks with multiple summons, dazing spell shenanigans, and things more of that nature. 7-10 is territory that few should tread if at all possible, and that's about the point where I would say the game breaks down. Keeping a hard cap at around 6 would be where I would want to take things, and I've been thinking of working on a wizard that tops out at a 6.


I think I can see where your scale goes a bit better now.

I can see easy ways to raise the floors, if you're fine with burning it all down and starting over. The problem is Paizo definitely can't do that, and I don't think that most casual groups would be cool with it either.

Just make menus of things you have to take one of, and remove the freedom of choice to make bad decisions. That's basically what they did with D&D4 and basically when everyone has a basic strike+2 or a strike +2 ac or a strike + 1 bleed damage, that's the new normal. It's boring and feels try-hard.

If you raise the optimization floor, you'll help those with the lowest floors currently, but I think it'll just lead to class-based genericide ultimately.

I think the price of build diversity and the need to keep publishing new features is that 80% of them are going to be trap options, and that blah core classes (and most non-blah core classes) are going to have low floors, and I'm not sure there's anything to be done about it.


Cleric is MAD enough that no matter where you put your points, unless they're all in INT, you'll be OK at something. Either a decent channeler, a tank, a caster, a DEX warrior, or a full-on STR battle cleric.

I'm pretty sure fighter is self-explanatory enough that if you have loads of STR, you'll be OK. Perhaps the floor could be higher than low 1?

Also, can you give a more precise scale of what each number in 1-10 means? Such as:
1: Cannot perform any role effectively, doesn't even have a good enough chassis + proficiencies to fight like a comparably-leveled commoner, and has a similar number of skill points.
2: Cannot perform any role effectively, but is built on a decent enough chassis that it can fight like a comparably-leveled aristocrat or can make skill checks more effectively than one.
3: etc.

Silver Crusade

My Self wrote:

Also, can you give a more precise scale of what each number in 1-10 means? Such as:

1: Cannot perform any role effectively, doesn't even have a good enough chassis + proficiencies to fight like a comparably-leveled commoner, and has a similar number of skill points.
2: Cannot perform any role effectively, but is built on a decent enough chassis that it can fight like a comparably-leveled aristocrat or can make skill checks more effectively than one.
3: etc.

Okay, again this is only my opinion, so if anyone thinks they have better examples of this, let me know.

1: Barely able to fill a single role, unable to perform more than one role competently.
Example: core rulebook rogue

2: Good at a single role, or able to perform 2 or more roles competently.
Example: basic switch hitter ranger

3: Great at a single role, or able to fill 2 or more roles competently.
Example: basic support bard

4: Great at a single role, and able to fill 2 or more roles with equal skill.
Example: baseline chained summoner

5: Amazing at a single role, or able to fill 2 or more roles greatly.
Example: considerably optimized inquisitor

6: Amazing at a single role, and able to fill 2 or more roles with equal skill.
Example: considerably optimized alchemist with favorable archetypes (beastmorph/vivi, grenadier, etc)

7: Too good at a single role, or able to fill 2 or more roles amazingly.
Example: well optimized chained master summoner

8: Too good at a single role, and able to fill 2 or more roles with equal skill.
Example: non rules exploiting god wizard

9: Completely broken, limited only by spells known.
Example: rule exploiting sorcerer (snocone wish machine, wbl breaking, blood money exploits, etc...)

10: Completely broken, limited only by spells per day
Example: rules exploiting god wizard (snocone wish machine, wbl breaking, blood money exploits, etc...)

Yeah, 9-10 aren't really too different, just magnitudes of the amount of nukes they can bring. Sorc has to dedicate to their tricks, wizard picks up new ones when it wants.

While we can argue "the GM can keep it in check", the GM doesn't need to keep a class with 1-4 in check for the most part (sometimes damage increases too fast or whatnot). This is why 2-6 is my ideal play range, although I tend to stay 3-5 myself, as I love taking a martial character up to a 3 (my gunslinger guide's based around that idea), but the idea that some classes get to a point where they can be too good to play with others (about 7 and up) makes for problems.

Personally, I'd love to see another unchained where we see unchained versions of the wizard, cleric, druid, and such where they try to bring down the ceiling, but at the same time give them nice thematic things to help compensate for that.


I like how you have "limited only by spells known" for levels 9 and 10. Because we all know martials can't break the game that badly.

Weird exception for Cleric- they know all their spells.

And what exactly is "too good"? Breaks CR estimate? Can consistently pull off a trick or many tricks that end encounters within a round or two?

Silver Crusade

My Self wrote:

I like how you have "limited only by spells known" for levels 9 and 10. Because we all know martials can't break the game that badly.

Weird exception for Cleric- they know all their spells.

And what exactly is "too good"? Breaks CR estimate? Can consistently pull off a trick or many tricks that end encounters within a round or two?

I would say so to both of those, since even not exploiting rules, dazing spell wizards as well as other tricks help to decimate encounters, and the sheer variety of spells one can get can help to trivialize any encounter that isn't straight GM fiat. 7 and 8 to me are the points where the mages aren't playing to have fun, they're playing to WIN, and to do that they'll use most of their 'logical' tricks to do it if the GM doesn't put a stop to it fast, with 9-10 being literal breaking of the game.

You'll see people talking about with Master Summoner how they have so many summons on the board, there's no use in fighting them. And while you could say "those aren't CR appropriate to take down encounters", at the end of the day it's a numbers game, allowing for field clogging, smaller benefits, and other powerful abilities to just devastate CR estimations. That's just one of their tricks along with a spell list that'll make a proud GM humble enough to use fiat to stop it.

Even as villains, a wizard or cleric using the full glut of their spells against a party makes for a WAY more challenging experience than a martial of equal level swinging some steel around like a jerk. 7-8 is where the casters take off the kid gloves, and 9-10 is where the casters WIN the game by any way possible.


And how are you taking stat distribution into account? Are you assuming the wizard maxed his INT, the cleric maxed his WIS, and the fighter maxed his STR? Build by build, there are lots of ways to ruin a Fighter, but you could also destroy a Sorcerer through poor spell selection and trying to be some sort of melee combatant without polymorph effects. Swashbucklers can afford to have either their STR or their DEX to be low, but if you're a Sorcerer who starts with less than 13 CHA, you're utterly hosed.

RPG Superstar Season 9 Top 16

I'd agree with the people that think it's easier to make a bad druid than a bad barbarian.

The barbarian concept is straightforward. Get a big weapon, rage, hit things.

The druid concept is complex. Managing the pet is another character. The spell list doesn't have famous winners like a wizard or cleric might (besides summons, but that's yet more to manage). To use wildshape optimally, you need to become familiar with all the animals out there, and the limits/capabilities of the beast shape spells.

Silver Crusade

My Self wrote:
And how are you taking stat distribution into account? Are you assuming the wizard maxed his INT, the cleric maxed his WIS, and the fighter maxed his STR? Build by build, there are lots of ways to ruin a Fighter, but you could also destroy a Sorcerer through poor spell selection and trying to be some sort of melee combatant without polymorph effects. Swashbucklers can afford to have either their STR or their DEX to be low, but if you're a Sorcerer who starts with less than 13 CHA, you're utterly hosed.

For floors, we're assuming basic competence at stat placement, so a wizard doesn't have a floor of 1 because you can give them an 8 intelligence to start. Consider it from the point of what advice you'd give to someone starting, "high strength is good for attacks, and wizards need intelligence to cast!"

This is partially why the rogue is low 1, and why I'd probably say the unrogue is high 1 due to the rogue needing like 6 stats to be high and the unrogue needing like 3.

Petty Alchemy wrote:

I'd agree with the people that think it's easier to make a bad druid than a bad barbarian.

The barbarian concept is straightforward. Get a big weapon, rage, hit things.

The druid concept is complex. Managing the pet is another character. The spell list doesn't have famous winners like a wizard or cleric might (besides summons, but that's yet more to manage). To use wildshape optimally, you need to become familiar with all the animals out there, and the limits/capabilities of the beast shape spells.

I've actually heard both sides of this argument, and there's a lot of strong things you can 'trip' into as a druid. Some druids pick up entangle since it seems fun, and it turns out super good. Some pick a big cat for a partner, and it ends up shredding things early game. Wild Shape takes a bit more mastery, but not a lot. Druid could be high 2 for some, but to me, it's a solid 3.


CWheezy wrote:
Only the maximum is important for balance.

This is only true in a competitive environment, and Pathfinder is rarely played competitively. I don't actively try to TPK my players, and in fact try to find a sweet spot that plays nicely. In effect, there's no real competitive pressure here to weed out sub-optimal strategies from the player-base, and without that pressure many people have no reason to rise significantly above the power floor. In fact, in Pathfinder playing close to the power ceiling can get you derided as a munchkin or power-gamer and as a result there's often a pressure to do the opposite! While some groups may have a competitive spirit that drives them towards the ceiling, I suspect this is the exception and not the norm.

While I still think the power ceiling matters in Pathfinder, the power floor is more significant.


I think it matters because pathfinder is a very dangerous world, and monsters really will kill and eat you. I think staying alive is pretty good pressure.

Also the people who call out munchkin are not really worth listening to, they are what's called a scrub. They Blame the player for using the tools the game gives them, which is nonsense. It is not up to me as a player to also be a game designer.

Silver Crusade

CWheezy wrote:

I think it matters because pathfinder is a very dangerous world, and monsters really will kill and eat you. I think staying alive is pretty good pressure.

Also the people who call out munchkin are not really worth listening to, they are what's called a scrub. They Blame the player for using the tools the game gives them, which is nonsense. It is not up to me as a player to also be a game designer.

For the most part, adventure design caters to the floor though, there's not many APs where you need to be rocking empowered dazing spell perfection fireballs to win. I do think that the ceiling should be lowered on most full casters, but for a non competitive game, the floor seems to be a better point to balance around.

Really, the average AP can be done with people playing in the 1-3/4 territory, 5-6 is excessive for most non Age of Worms APs, and 7-8 is excessive in most non completely powergamed scenarios, with 9-10 just being too excessive period.

While I agree that people calling others munchkins/powergamers/rollplayers is silly, it happens, and some people want to avoid that, so they'll try to match the group's level as much as possible.

Another note here is that the amount of effort to increase one from each level is relative. A fighter going from a 1 to a 4 takes far more effort than a wizard doing the same since they represent less expenditure of effort, since the wizard's ceiling has so much more to offer.

Also any character generally reaching their ceiling will be considered a powergamer by those who would use such terms, even in a party with a character playing at a higher point in their progression, which amuses me. A fighter at 4 is considered a powergamer while a wizard at 5 would probably considered par for the course.


The deal with the Fighter example is that Fighters pulling a 4 will be amazing at dealing damage. Damage is the most visible number, the most easily controllable by game designers, and by far the most controlled number. Meanwhile, the much of the Wizard's 9-10-ness is from non-damage abilities. Wizards are great at things the Fighter isn't good at. Fighters can do damage, but when it moves beyond numerical effects, Wizards can do all sorts of crazy stuff. Doing damage is the way you're supposed to kill things, and what Fighters are based all around. Wizards can kill things by dumping them off cliffs or into other planes or making them fall asleep mid-combat. Wizards can act laterally to do things other than damage, which is not quite factored into class balance.

Maybe this scale could be a 2-axis scale: How good a class is at their job or jobs, and how many roles they can fill.

X axis:
1: Cannot fill any jobs (Unarchetyped Core Monk)
2: Can fill one job primarily (Fighter)
3: Can fill one job primarily, and another job secondarily (Ranger)
4: Can fill multiple jobs primarily or almost all jobs secondarily, or can alter abilities to do all jobs secondarily (Bard)
5: Can fill all jobs primarily, or can alter abilities to do all jobs primarily (Wizard)

Y axis:
1: Cannot do job at all. (Commoner)
2: Can do primary job decently
3: Can do primary job effectively (Fighter)
4: Can do primary job more effectively than anyone else
5: Can force GM intervention (Wizard)


I notice that things like revised action economy, stamina, automatic bonus progression, and skill unlocks can move the ceilings and floors.

Silver Crusade

My Self wrote:

Maybe this scale could be a 2-axis scale: How good a class is at their job or jobs, and how many roles they can fill.

X axis:
1: Cannot fill any jobs (Unarchetyped Core Monk)
2: Can fill one job primarily (Fighter)
3: Can fill one job primarily, and another job secondarily (Ranger)
4: Can fill multiple jobs primarily or almost all jobs secondarily, or can alter abilities to do all jobs secondarily (Bard)
5: Can fill all jobs primarily, or can alter abilities to do all jobs primarily (Wizard)

Y axis:
1: Cannot do job at all. (Commoner)
2: Can do primary job decently
3: Can do primary job effectively (Fighter)
4: Can do primary job more effectively than anyone else
5: Can force GM intervention (Wizard)

This could work, although it gets a little more complex than I would like (much like breaking down floors and ceilings by level grouping, or heaven forbid, level by level), although it's not a bad idea. The only thing I'd really change is remove commoner from the Y axis (since it shouldn't be relevant to PC class discussion) and change the fighter from effective to decent, since as discussed at length in fighter threads, fighters are okay at dealing damage, but not at dealing with conditions that would negate their ability to do damage, unlike other classes (barbarians can get short term flying, rangers can have flying animal companions, etc...), so the Y axis may need some work.

Rhedyn wrote:
I notice that things like revised action economy, stamina, automatic bonus progression, and skill unlocks can move the ceilings and floors.

Note that really only one thing you've mentioned there (revised action economy) actually lowers a ceiling, although the rest are great for raising floors. The only danger of raising a floor is making the base mechanic too complex, which is why a lot of proposed fighter fixes are tossed by the wayside due to people enjoying the simplicity of the fighter.

I'm a large proponent of some spells taking longer (full round, 1 round, or 2 rounds) to cast to balance out some things, since there's far too many standard action casting in the core rules.


CWheezy wrote:

I think it matters because pathfinder is a very dangerous world, and monsters really will kill and eat you. I think staying alive is pretty good pressure.

Also the people who call out munchkin are not really worth listening to, they are what's called a scrub. They Blame the player for using the tools the game gives them, which is nonsense. It is not up to me as a player to also be a game designer.

I understand the play to win [P2W] attitude, having been an MMO gamer myself. When you're playing a game where the objective is objective [to beat the environment or other players, in the case of pvp] then I fully support using any and all means within the system to beat the ever living snot out of things. Players in that complain about your ''optimization'' in that sense are quite frankly... scrubs.

Pathfinder is not an MMO, it is a shared story-telling experience. It's goal is Subjective. The ''P2W' attitude of making excessively powered characters doesn't stand because the Subjective goal of Pathfinder is the fun of the players involved. Now there are home game groups that invite such kind of optimization/minmax /powergaming. However, I submit that is the minority of players and most prefer less power/min-max [because those traits are often paired with a lack of roleplay].

I also submit that P2W attitude of ''using all available tools of the game'' falls flat when you consider the attitude was adopted for games that have limitations, where as Pathfinder has no limitations. There is no operating system, and theoretically it is impossible to ever hit the ''maximum'' the game has to offer.


N. Jolly wrote:
My Self wrote:

Maybe this scale could be a 2-axis scale: How good a class is at their job or jobs, and how many roles they can fill.

X axis:
1: Cannot fill any jobs (Unarchetyped Core Monk)
2: Can fill one job primarily (Fighter)
3: Can fill one job primarily, and another job secondarily (Ranger)
4: Can fill multiple jobs primarily or almost all jobs secondarily, or can alter abilities to do all jobs secondarily (Bard)
5: Can fill all jobs primarily, or can alter abilities to do all jobs primarily (Wizard)

Y axis:
1: Cannot do job at all. (Commoner)
2: Can do primary job decently
3: Can do primary job effectively (Fighter)
4: Can do primary job more effectively than anyone else
5: Can force GM intervention (Wizard)

This could work, although it gets a little more complex than I would like (much like breaking down floors and ceilings by level grouping, or heaven forbid, level by level), although it's not a bad idea. The only thing I'd really change is remove commoner from the Y axis (since it shouldn't be relevant to PC class discussion) and change the fighter from effective to decent, since as discussed at length in fighter threads, fighters are okay at dealing damage, but not at dealing with conditions that would negate their ability to do damage, unlike other classes (barbarians can get short term flying, rangers can have flying animal companions, etc...), so the Y axis may need some work.

Rhedyn wrote:
I notice that things like revised action economy, stamina, automatic bonus progression, and skill unlocks can move the ceilings and floors.

Note that really only one thing you've mentioned there (revised action economy) actually lowers a ceiling, although the rest are great for raising floors. The only danger of raising a floor is making the base mechanic too complex, which is why a lot of proposed fighter fixes are tossed by the wayside due to people enjoying the simplicity of the fighter.

I'm a large proponent of some spells taking longer (full round, 1...

I find the revised action economy simpler and easier to teach.

Automatic bonuses are less complicated than crafting or buying needed items

Stamina and skill unlocks are more complicated but I feel also impact the fighter the least. Stamina is a straight buff, but situationally.


My Self wrote:
I'm pretty sure fighter is self-explanatory enough that if you have loads of STR, you'll be OK. Perhaps the floor could be higher than low 1?

Nah, I've seen a guy who wanted to play a smart, charismatic warlord play a fighter with a 13 strength. Back in 3.5 but the principle should be the same.

And yes, on a 1-10 scale of power the character was definitely trying to edge her way below 1.


Redjack_rose wrote:
CWheezy wrote:

I think it matters because pathfinder is a very dangerous world, and monsters really will kill and eat you. I think staying alive is pretty good pressure.

Also the people who call out munchkin are not really worth listening to, they are what's called a scrub. They Blame the player for using the tools the game gives them, which is nonsense. It is not up to me as a player to also be a game designer.

I understand the play to win [P2W] attitude, having been an MMO gamer myself. When you're playing a game where the objective is objective [to beat the environment or other players, in the case of pvp] then I fully support using any and all means within the system to beat the ever living snot out of things. Players in that complain about your ''optimization'' in that sense are quite frankly... scrubs.

Pathfinder is not an MMO, it is a shared story-telling experience. It's goal is Subjective. The ''P2W' attitude of making excessively powered characters doesn't stand because the Subjective goal of Pathfinder is the fun of the players involved. Now there are home game groups that invite such kind of optimization/minmax /powergaming. However, I submit that is the minority of players and most prefer less power/min-max [because those traits are often paired with a lack of roleplay].

I also submit that P2W attitude of ''using all available tools of the game'' falls flat when you consider the attitude was adopted for games that have limitations, where as Pathfinder has no limitations. There is no operating system, and theoretically it is impossible to ever hit the ''maximum'' the game has to offer.

Even without a P2W attitude, a poorly built Core Rogue in a party of say, a Wizard, Inquisitor, and Paladin, is not going to have much to do. Sure, if they can roleplay, that's great and all, but the rogue lacks options and abilities that the other party members have. The Wizard can decide to sidestep encounters and social situations entirely through use of spells. The rogue's ability to be stealthy pales in comparison to the Inquisitor's ability to cast Invisibility- and Inquisitors have enough points to burn on Stealth, anyways. Even the Paladin will deal comparable, if not better damage in combat, will be tougher to take down, and will be charming enough to deal with some out-of-combat situations. The Rogue would be a burden on the rest of the party, and will probably end up getting dominated, charmed, or killed, given that the Rogue will also likely have the lowest AC and important saves. Even assuming everybody chooses poorly in their build, the Rogue is going to be the least and worst. It's not fun to be a drain on the party, and it's not fun to have someone else draining party resources. More often than not, the Rogue could end up not contributing in combat, and being close to useless outside of combat. That doesn't sound like a fun character to play, regardless of what the character flavor is.

Community / Forums / Pathfinder / Pathfinder First Edition / General Discussion / Class floors and ceilings All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.