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This is a point I brought up in another thread, but it's something I wanted to discuss more in depth and get some ideas on.
Something I wanted to ask here; does anyone think that anyone above T3 is needed in an AP? Like any of them, or are there certain ones that require that level of narrative power more than others?
To shorthand, T3 is effectively 6th level casters/sphere casters as far as I have been lead to believe/TOB or POW martials/other things of that caliber.
I really feel like keeping all players at T5-T3 would help solve a lot, since from what I've seen, higher than that almost feels like NPC levels of needed narrative control. As I've said before, Paizo hits it out of the park on T3 design, so much so that I think full casters are almost superfluous to the system.
I've been thinking of doing something for a while of making a 6th level caster version of wizard and cleric, although witch and oracle probably need it more due to them having a more interesting narrative niche.
Really a 6th level caster wizard could be interesting, maybe continuing to give them higher level slots, but not learn any spells of those levels, so they're just metamagic fillers.
Overall, if we cut arcanist/cleric/druid/oracle/sorcerer/witch/wizard and replaces them with their 6th level caster counterparts, the game and the level of play would seriously increase. Really it seems what spheres and POW were aiming for, a solid inclusion at the T3 level that would help balance the game. I believe 9th level casting isn't needed in this system, maybe lower a few spell levels to make sure we're still getting some of the more important thematic spells, but everything else? It's just too much to have in the hands of players.
I will admit this idea will take some adjustment (summon spells should be readjusted to when they're received for one, possibly drop the levels of resurrection magic, etc), but the crux of this discussion stands: Are 7th-9th level spells needed in this game? I mean we could reconfigure wizards and such to be 6th level casters, compensate them for the lowered power in different ways, but just removing these spell levels from the game would help not only the C/M disparity, but also probably give a better narrative range for storytelling.
Personally, I like the idea of 7th-9th level spells being NPC caster classes, things outside the player's abilities, make more of a 'boss class' to have involved in the design process, and hell even makes dragons more scary to have them access spells the PCs could only dream about.
We could even have the PCs be able to gain only 1 of a 7th+ level spell, have it somehow related to their specialty, that way it's not entirely barred off, but that's debatable.
So what exactly are you asking here?
Is that if you could complete every current AP with only up to T3 classes, by the definition you are using?
Or if the game is general would be better if we didnt have 7-9th level of spells?
The first question i cant answer since i didnt play every single AP made yet , so i cant be sure.
The second one , in my opinion , is a pretty bad one , but then again like in the other threads i didnt agree with nerfing casters in the first place to ground them more.
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So what exactly are you asking here?
Is that if you could complete every current AP with only up to T3 classes, by the definition you are using?
Or if the game is general would be better if we didnt have 7-9th level of spells?
The first question i cant answer since i didnt play every single AP made yet , so i cant be sure.
The second one , in my opinion , is a pretty bad one , but then again like in the other threads i didnt agree with nerfing casters in the first place to ground them more.
For the sake of this discussion, let's assume anything that isn't a full caster is considered T3 or lower since aside from Summoner, that's generally the case. So I'm talking about all 6th level casters and below in the casting bracket.
Yeah, I was asking if full casting is every needed in APs. If anyone knows of an AP in which actually requires a full caster. I've read over a few, and that doesn't seem to be the case. They're useful, but not vital.
As for the second, I think of this less as nerfing casters and more about bringing down the ceiling for the entire game. The ceiling of casters is exponentially higher than the ceiling for mundanes, and in most of the stories I've seen Paizo attempting to tell with APs, the level of power that full casters bring is just needless.
If you pull out sixth to ninth level spells, you may as well make the lists interchangeable. That way you can actually dispense with necessary classes more or less. Drop a spell level for your specialization, and Bob's your uncle.
Hmm.
- Anything that can only be removed by Wish or Miracle.
- Trapping a soul.
- Resurrection/True Resurrection.
- And if things really go off the rails, Mage's Disjunction on an artifact.
Those are the most likely things I can think of. I don't think any APs require those, though. (Technically Medium could do any of those, but that's a little specific.)
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Does pathfinder need inquisitors? It's about options people like, not the sufficient conditions to complete an AP?
Well part of this was actually to discuss AP design. Personally, I think it's pretty nice that there's not a "You must have this many full casters to advance" sign on things. I've ready through consul of thieves, serpent's skull, skull and shackles, carrion crown, and a few others, and they thankfully don't seem to need this level of power.
I'm not saying the concept of the wizard or other full casters needs to be taken out of the game, just that the level of narrative power they have is excessive for anything that's published. Trust me, I've had fun with a few of them, I just feel like design could be better suited steering away from making more (ACG was pretty decent about this), or focusing on their support.
From everything I have read, APs are not designed with the assumptions of optimized characters or the assumption of any given class. They are intentionally set to easy mode.
As for whether the game in general needs full casters...I think there is a niche there for classes which only use magic, but I don't think full 9th level casting is necessary. You would probably have to adjust wizards and similar classes in other ways though if you were to restrict casting to no spells over 6th level.
The idea works well. I've found over the years that GMing is much easier if you have access to more powerful stuff (particularly spells and magic) than the players. They have teamwork instead.
However, any attempt to remove anyone's toys will lead to animosity and resistance.
With the way the game is written yes. If you want to start talking about houseruling things then we can get rid of a lot of other things.
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I think that this kind of argument is always missing a key word: "potential".
Spellcasters with 9 levels of spells have a lot of potential narrative power.
But the guy with diplomacy +30 has a lot of narrative power too. Starting with a unfriendly guy he can move it to friendly with a roll of 1 (unless the target has a charisma bonus) and then ask him favors.
The target will reveal an important secret with a die roll of -10
Reveal an important secret DC 10 + creature's Cha modifier +10 or more, so DC 20+
or
Give aid that could result in punishment +15 or more
so a DC of 25+
die roll needed to get that -5!
Why that "potential" narrative is rarely a problem? Because generally applying it require playing time, time in the gaming world and the GM will not allow excessive requests.
Now the "potential" narrative power of spellcaster. Some of that is inapplicable outside of campaigns whit a lot of downtime.
Sure, a spellcaster can create a demiplane spending from 2 to 6 hours casting the appropriate spell. How often that spell was used in your campaign?
He can resurrect a disintegrated friend. Oh, wait, you are suggesting to make that a lower level spell, so I suppose that you feel that forever losing a character to a bad save sucks.
Teleport? You can read my posts in other threads, my opinion is that if you read the spell, even with greater teleport you sill need a reliable description of the destination. knowing that a city called New York exist isn't enough. You need a description of an area of the city.
We can go on for a long list of supposed overpowered options available to spellcasters. Some actually exist, but most of them depend on overly permissive reading of the rules or require a lot of time rarely available in a campaign.
So, my opinion is that you are trying to cure something that mostly isn't related with higher level spells but on GMing and players exploits.
From everything I have read, APs are not designed with the assumptions of optimized characters or the assumption of any given class. They are intentionally set to easy mode.
As for whether the game in general needs full casters...I think there is a niche there for classes which only use magic, but I don't think full 9th level casting is necessary. You would probably have to adjust wizards and similar classes in other ways though if you were to restrict casting to no spells over 6th level.
If I may add something to that statement, APs aren't designed around specific classes, because the players might not be these classes. APs "might" not need 9th level spells, because PCs might have access to them.
Sure, a "typical" party might have a fighter, rogue, cleric and wizard, but... what if you have 6 players, but none of them is one of those classes, let alone one of those roles?
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Does it need dragons? Horses? Swords? Critical hits? Traps? Levels? Gold? Hit points?
Nothing personal, but this is another one of those thread titles that helps remind me why I still think this whole "Warriors VS Wizards" crusade is mainly just a runaway katamari of dumb.
People who REALLY hate the basic D&D paradigm so much that it would take a radical Ship of Theseus-like reconfiguration of everything for them to be satisfied (inevitably dissatisfying others in the process, and so on) still have many, many other RPGs to choose from. I have my issues with the game, and ideas for how I'd house-rule some things, but I enjoy it for what it is.
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I think that this kind of argument is always missing a key word: "potential".
Spellcasters with 9 levels of spells have a lot of potential narrative power.
But the guy with diplomacy +30 has a lot of narrative power too. Starting with a unfriendly guy he can move it to friendly with a roll of 1 (unless the target has a charisma bonus) and then ask him favors.
The target will reveal an important secret with a die roll of -10
Reveal an important secret DC 10 + creature's Cha modifier +10 or more, so DC 20+
or
Give aid that could result in punishment +15 or more
so a DC of 25+
die roll needed to get that -5!Why that "potential" narrative is rarely a problem? Because generally applying it require playing time, time in the gaming world and the GM will not allow excessive requests.
Now the "potential" narrative power of spellcaster. Some of that is inapplicable outside of campaigns whit a lot of downtime.
Sure, a spellcaster can create a demiplane spending from 2 to 6 hours casting the appropriate spell. How often that spell was used in your campaign?
He can resurrect a disintegrated friend. Oh, wait, you are suggesting to make that a lower level spell, so I suppose that you feel that forever losing a character to a bad save sucks.
Teleport? You can read my posts in other threads, my opinion is that if you read the spell, even with greater teleport you sill need a reliable description of the destination. knowing that a city called New York exist isn't enough. You need a description of an area of the city.
We can go on for a long list of supposed overpowered options available to spellcasters. Some actually exist, but most of them depend on overly permissive reading of the rules or require a lot of time rarely available in a campaign.So, my opinion is that you are trying to cure something that mostly isn't related with higher level spells but on GMing and players exploits.
Oh trust me, I'm well aware of how busted diplomacy is. But again, charm person works just as well in a lot of cases. But this isn't a thread to talk about how busted diplomacy is.
Really while you're saying 'supposedly' on some of the more broken things, the statement of a permissive reading is often aligning quite often with RAW. Hell, at 11th level all you need is a great white whale and you can have free expensive material components for wish with only 4 spells. That's not hyperbole, I demonstrated it in a different thread.
My issue is that the ceiling of 9th level casting is excessive. I think it's interesting that so many of the products that are heralded as more balanced are really hitting around the T3 level of balance. It's potential, yes. But it's also unneeded. I mean I've had games with mages (and ran mages) who completely destroyed encounters with a spell. They didn't 'win' them, but they did set the party up to win instantly after casting (shivering touch...bad memories...)
There's very few 7th-9th level spells that need to exist for the game to work, at least in my opinion. Like I said, I'd probably lower some spell levels for this to make sure certain narrative concepts still worked (earlier necromancy access, dropping the level of some summon spells), but at the same time things like gate, simulacrum, wish, time stop, miracle, and plenty of others are just excessive. They could stay in the game as scrolls, but as things the PCs can access X times per day I don't think they should exist.
Nothing personal, but this is another one of those thread titles that helps remind me why I still think this whole "Warriors VS Wizards" crusade is mainly just a runaway katamari of dumb.
Yeah, I realize not everyone cares about balance, some people enjoy the imbalance. I think I'd rather just see the imbalance at lesser levels. I'm glad it's not an issue for you though.
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A party along the lines of Inquisitor, Bard, Magus, Warpriest is perfectly adequate for most adventure paths. Mechanically, full casters aren't needed. But some people like them.
I've hardly ever seen level 7+ spells being cast, so whether they're needed, overpowered or fun has rarely been an issue.
Yeah, I realize not everyone cares about balance, some people enjoy the imbalance. I think I'd rather just see the imbalance at lesser levels. I'm glad it's not an issue for you though.
It is not an issue. It is a potential issue at certain tables, and the word balance means different things to different people. Many times even when it is a real problem at a table, the source is due to differences in playstyles due to everyone have a different idea of what the unwritten social contract should be.
That is why I said in the other ongoing thread that each table would be better off discussing it's issues and fixing those specific issues because what works for one table is not going to work for another.
There is no one size fits all solution.
The game has problems that will often call out full caster spells, so yeah they are needed, or at least their spells are. If you keep the spells, and remove the classes then it still opens up other problems.
To sum this up imbalance does not even exist for everyone and for those that do say it exist, I can't even seem to find a common definition. Some want all classes to have the same narrative potential, other want to see the same combat potential, and the list goes on.
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It is not an issue. It is a potential issue at certain tables, and the word balance means different things to different people. Many times even when it is a real problem at a table, the source is due to differences in playstyles due to everyone have a different idea of what the unwritten social contract should be.
That is why I said in the other ongoing thread that each table would be better off discussing it's issues and fixing those specific issues because what works for one table is not going to work for another.
There is no one size fits all solution.
The game has problems that will often call out full caster spells, so yeah they are needed, or at least their spells are. If you keep the spells, and remove the classes then it still opens up other problems.
To sum this up imbalance does not even exist for everyone and for those that do say it exist, I can't even seem to find a common definition. Some want all classes to have the same narrative potential, other want to see the same combat potential, and the list goes on.
That's fair, I think trying to avoid 9th level casters is going to be an experiment I try at my tables from now on, I might even try to finally make my first foray into play by post for this to get more data on it since this is something I'd like to explore more.
I think that for a lot of the stories APs are trying to tell, 9th level casters are excessive. It's my hope that if we get a PF 2.0, they greatly consider toning down these casters since PF does GREAT 6th level casters.
7th to 9th level casting/spells are probably needed for world building and plot device reasons more than they are for actual play reasons.
You need wish so that you have proper genies. You need planar binding so that the BBEG can force the genie to give him wishes. You need plane shift so that the party can chase him across time and space. You need imprisonment so that you can permanently seal away the BBEG once and for all.
Plane Shift and Planar Binding are in the 6/9 caster realm, actually. They do feel cooler as max level spells, definitely, so they fit a 6/9 caster game well.
"Need?" Probably not; at least as "normal" PC/NPC options. The highest level spells (7th-9th) can be reserved for "magical" creatures (dragons, fey, genies/other outsiders, etc.), mythic tiers (if used), and/or occult rituals (requiring large groups and hours/days).
Wholesale redesign of classes is probably not needed; restricting classes (with some creation/modification of archetypes) works just as well in most cases. Clerics and oracles are replaced by inquisitors and warpriests; druids are replaced by hunters; sorcerers, witches, and wizards are replaced with alchemists, bloodragers, investigators (possibly psychic detectives), magi (eldritch scions can sub for sorcerers; hex magi can sub for witches, especially if the spell list or Spell Blending arcana is modified to grant access to witch spells, hex magi use a familiar instead of a spellbook, etc.), mesmerists, occultists, spiritualists (some can act as divine casters, as well), and summoners (use the Unchained version, if you're concerned about the power level of the eidolon/spell list); mediums can act as either arcane or divine casters, depending on the spirit bound (you may wish to alter the Legendary Archmage and/or Legendary Hierophant supreme spirit powers; then again, you may not).
It could make for an interesting home-brew setting, IMO.
From my recent experience running level 18 play, high-level spells are often unnecessary outside story elements. Once you pass level 6 spells you start having less to choose from at each level, and many of the best ones are spells that don't allow a save or give such a tremendous advantage that whoever casts it first wins. Stuff like Time Stop, scintillating pattern, irresistible dance, and the like end encounters with little chance of counterplay. If some spells like Gate, Greater Planar Binding, and True Resurrection existed as rituals or very rare scrolls so they were limited in availability, the game could certainly work without the rest. Leaving the slots for metamagic is a good idea too.
It's not the 7-9th level spells that are going to be issues. It's getting the 3rd level spells at level 5 and the 5th level spells at level 9 and so forth that wind up important. This comes up most with cleric spells because of the expectation that every cleric has every spell, but I think some assume teleportation and parties that don't have it will have less access to shops than the game math expects.
I suspect that Emerald Spire may be nearly impossible as written without a crafter because of the poor loot variety and lack of access to a large city.
Full casters would still get those at the same time, they simply wouldn't have access to any spells over Level 6 and could only use those slots for metamagic.
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Caveat- Nothing is "required". A fun game can be had with any group that forms a coherent, to the group, playstyle.
Thematically I feel that full casters are of benefit to the game and thus are required as they fill the niche of allowing for people to play a non-physical character, which some people enjoy.
Mechanically as they exist now, absolutely I believe they are NOT required.
I will post here what I have said before about C/MD and just say that the idea of mechanically altering the full casters classes to be less powerful is something I could get behind.
I would not enjoy having slots but no spells, and I think this would be a design mistake, simply due to player desire to "get" something at level-up. Some players and anecdotally all of the players I know will and would feel cheated by the idea of getting 7th level spell slots but there no being seventh level spells.
Now I can see a rebalanced game being fun but I believe it will take; Link
Remove WBL and Expected gear. Basically R.I.P. christmas tree effect. Possibly eliminate all items that grant flat bonuses, i.e. no more stat belts/bands/+weapons/+armor or shield.
Mathhammer the whole system from the ground up. CMB vs CMD saves VS DC's Attack VS AC all need redone.
Rewrite the combat rules, eliminating the idea of Reality or "making sense". Write it solely as a game and use specific game terms none of this attack action vs attack as an action nonsense or wield vs wield.
Rewrite the magic chapter and spells to lower overall power level and remove "Gotcha" spells such as Simulacrum, Create Undead, and Planar Binding.
Rewrite skills to be worth something and to be something a character can be based around.
Rewrite weapons and armor so that there are valid weapon choices beyond 1 or 2 per category and more than one best armor choice.
Condense and enhance feats so having more is a good thing rather than "Yeah I can trade for another Rage power/Exploit."
After rewriting all of this mathhammer again.
And just to be clear do all of this with the focus on creating a readable, understandable, and internally consistent rule-set, not a setting. All of this should be done based on what makes the game work not on "reality" or "this book was cool" or "I don't/do like that."
This is how you get Martial ~= Casters
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Personally, I'd make it so that 9th level casters gain up to 6th level casting, and spells they cast that take up a slot 3 levels lower than their highest do not consume spell slots.
Then I'd do something like give spontaneous full spellcasters the ability to reduce the cost of Metamagic spells by 1/5 their level.
BAM. Prepared spellcasters get to be super versatile and enjoy preparing a wider variety of useful spells, spontaneous spellcasters get powerful spells more easily. Win/win.
I mean, I say that. My suggestions are probably super broken, but w/e. It sounds fun to me at least. :P
Maybe just make all 7+ spells only available by specifically questing for them.
High level casters should at least get a +1 to DC to all their spells at level 15 and 18 (+2), so their spells keep pace with the saves of the opponents. Otherwise you would spend all your high level slots on just heightening them to keep them effective. Now you can also use another metamagic feat, so you really get like a maxed chain lightning that is effective instead of everyone having a succesful relex save.
If you're getting rid of Cleric, Oracle, and Witch you better be giving some other classes good healing specialization archetypes. Paladin has a good one and Bard has one that's...good enough but the one for Alchemist just lets them burn extracts for cures and breath of life (at a late level) and Inquisitor doesn't have any.
Yes I realize healing isn't nessisary but some people like being a healer.
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The one thing I'm a little concerned about is that monsters tend to get access to special conditions at around the same level that a full caster gets the spell to remove that condition. Partial progression casters will lag a bit behind on that bell curve - a Warpriest gets Remove Blindness at level 7 instead of level 5, for example.
It's not an insurmountable obstacle by any means, but it's something worth keeping an eye on when you look over the enemies the party will be facing.
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Really while you're saying 'supposedly' on some of the more broken things, the statement of a permissive reading is often aligning quite often with RAW. Hell, at 11th level all you need is a great white whale and you can have free expensive material components for wish with only 4 spells. That's not hyperbole, I demonstrated it in a different thread.
If your GM allow blood money. A secret spell theoretically available to a very small group of NPC.
Yes, if you accept the paradigm "this spell was published in a module so I can know it" you are right.
But it seem you have missed a point in my post:
"We can go on for a long list of supposed overpowered options available to spellcasters. Some actually exist, but most of them depend on overly permissive reading of the rules or require a lot of time rarely available in a campaign."
"I can choose my spells from any spell ever published" fall under overly permissive too. If a spell is a secret that can be found during a specific adventure treating it as something available to every character everywhere is extremely permissive.
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I would much rather see a system where magic overall is a bit more rare, where some spells are slightly dangerous and/or have a drawback.
But if a time ever comes where Pathfinder just drops full casters completely, that will probably be the time when I move on to a different game.
Really while you're saying 'supposedly' on some of the more broken things, the statement of a permissive reading is often aligning quite often with RAW. Hell, at 11th level all you need is a great white whale and you can have free expensive material components for wish with only 4 spells. That's not hyperbole, I demonstrated it in a different thread.If your GM allow blood money. A secret spell theoretically available to a very small group of NPC.
Yes, if you accept the paradigm "this spell was published in a module so I can know it" you are right.
But it seem you have missed a point in my post:"We can go on for a long list of supposed overpowered options available to spellcasters. Some actually exist, but most of them depend on overly permissive reading of the rules or require a lot of time rarely available in a campaign."
"I can choose my spells from any spell ever published" fall under overly permissive too. If a spell is a secret that can be found during a specific adventure treating it as something available to every character everywhere is extremely permissive.
The problem with secret hidden spells is basically sorcerers coming along and screwing things up. Sorcerers don't really study to gain their spells or page through spellbooks and esoteric lore they just kind of soulgasm into them. So once a sorcerer has access to a 'secret' spell lots of people want he goes 'Huh.. I should get scribe scroll and make myself a mint.' Honestly sorcerers and wizards having the exact same spell list rather than just a very very close one causes some wonky stuff. You might have to make it so wizards can't spellbook from sorcerer scrolls or something. We had a game once with a Blaster/Save or Suck sorcerer taking all the killy spells and scrolling them up for the wizard to add to his spell book so he could use all his free spells on utility and buffs.
As to the OP the more I think about it the more I'm willing to try a game with 7-9th level spells gone and full casters just getting a bunch of meta magic pumped slots, and *maybe* summons.. If my current playgroup weren't so casual that they wouldn't even notice if I had made that change I'd probably bang out a campaign for it tonight.
A lot of diseases and such start showing up at a certain time with the assumption that there's a cleric (or healing patron witch etc.) in your party. Encounter mechanics that are intended to be "save or be heavily inconvenienced for the duration of the encounter" become "save or die slowly and painfully".
This, of course, is easily fixed just by moving lesser resto/neutralize poison/whatever down a level or so on the Inquisitor list and such but it's still worth noting.
As to the OP the more I think about it the more I'm willing to try a game with 7-9th level spells gone and full casters just getting a bunch of meta magic pumped slots, and *maybe* summons.. If my current playgroup weren't so casual that they wouldn't even notice if I had made that change I'd probably bang out a campaign for it tonight.
This brings up another point. Things of this nature are usually only pervasive in the super-delving, tryhard, forum-going crowd. The casual/normal players (which logically make up the largest percentage of Pathfinder players) are vastly less impacted by perceived issues such as martial/caster disparity and others of its ilk that forumquesters crusade for/against on the messageboards.
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I have seen way more disparity happen in game by accident than by any malicious intent by the caster player... Actually, I don't think I've ever seen someone specifically build to nullify the abilities of a martial in the party. It just tends to happen that way.
This, of course, is easily fixed just by moving lesser resto/neutralize poison/whatever down a level or so on the Inquisitor list and such but it's still worth noting.
You could probably fill that gap with scrolls.
This, of course, is easily fixed just by moving lesser resto/neutralize poison/whatever down a level or so on the Inquisitor list and such but it's still worth noting.
Also might want to move Heal down to spell level 5 and Breath of Life to 4 so they can come in around the same time developers expect you to have them. True Restoration might want to be brought down to 6 as well with Restoration going down to 3. Lesser Restoration is just fine where it is though.
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Something I wanted to ask here; does anyone think that anyone above T3 is needed in an AP? Like any of them, or are there certain ones that require that level of narrative power more than others?
To shorthand, T3 is effectively 6th level casters/sphere casters as far as I have been lead to believe/TOB or POW martials/other things of that caliber.
Read As: Let's start ANOTHER Caster-Martial Disparity Thread.
Why don't you just play E6/E10 and even the board for everybody? It's not a sign of weakness to admit bias against casters and what they are capable of because instead of raw math they have the ability to bypass/alter narrative.
I really feel like keeping all players at T5-T3 would help solve a lot, since from what I've seen, higher than that almost feels like NPC levels of needed narrative control. As I've said before, Paizo hits it out of the park on T3 design, so much so that I think full casters are almost superfluous to the system.
I've been thinking of doing something for a while of making a 6th level caster version of wizard and cleric, although witch and oracle probably need it more due to them having a more interesting narrative niche.
Really a 6th level caster wizard could be interesting, maybe continuing to give them higher level slots, but not learn any spells of those levels, so they're just metamagic fillers.
And what happens when mages naturally optimize their stunted magic levels using those half-hearted fillers? The next levels of reform?
Overall, if we cut arcanist/cleric/druid/oracle/sorcerer/witch/wizard and replaces them with their 6th level caster counterparts, the game and the level of play would seriously increase. Really it seems what spheres and POW were aiming for, a solid inclusion at the T3 level that would help balance the game. I believe 9th level casting isn't needed in this system, maybe lower a few spell levels to make sure we're still getting some of the more important thematic spells, but everything else? It's just too much to have in the hands of players.
Sure buddy... let's turn EVERY Arcane stunted into it's own variant Magus/Bard/Summoner with all dem sweet class fixings. Divine Full-Tiers already had Average BAB so let's up them to FULL to put them to parity with beloved Fighter and Barbarian. Cleric would disappear into Warpriest, and Druid's Wildshape wouldn't be touched... he gets an Eidelon instead of an AC to compensate -that won't lead to Player/DM tears at all... Who'd want to play a TWICE-crippled Oracle with an optional Thrice-cursed archetype?
I will admit this idea will take some adjustment (summon spells should be readjusted to when they're received for one, possibly drop the levels of resurrection magic, etc), but the crux of this discussion stands: Are 7th-9th level spells needed in this game? I mean we could reconfigure wizards and such to be 6th level casters, compensate them for the lowered power in different ways, but just removing these spell levels from the game would help not only the C/M disparity, but also probably give a better narrative range for storytelling.
Personally, I like the idea of 7th-9th level spells being NPC caster classes, things outside the player's abilities, make more of a 'boss class' to have involved in the design process, and hell even makes dragons more scary to have them access spells the PCs could only dream about.
We could even have the PCs be able to gain only 1 of a 7th+ level spell, have it somehow related to their specialty, that way it's not entirely barred off, but that's debatable.
Read as: Mages exists as Healbots. Anything else threatens me.
Either cut it or don't. The "broken" spells are in the CRB, and resurrections are high-tier for a reason because of what they enable... let's even the board some more and drop magic weapons & armor to see how martials flounder in this mundane setting where they'll go up against Demons and Dragons with nary a +5 to bust through that DR.
Tier 7-9 spells justify the limited combat ability to full mages with their meager BAB, health, saves, skills, and feat access not tailored to spellcasting. Otherwise we would've gone for these other 2/3 (really half, if that) casters. It allows that creative power that comes with... playing a Role Playing Game?
"We can't let you be a Wizard that'll barrel roll Golarion, but we will allow you to make this campaign-custom class that'll heal our wounds and give us mad beatsticks to hurt the enemy with. Wanna play that?"
One can grief the campaign with cantrips alone. The rest is up to the DM and supporting Players to be able to cope with or better yet, control the antics of said antagonizing mage.
Does Pathfinder need full casters?
Given that, for many of us, Pathfinder is the rightful heir to the D&D legacy, it wouldn't feel right not to have the four most iconic character types in the game: fighters, magic users, clerics and thieves.
And while you can make those iconic character types on the chasis of many different extant PF classes, it still wouldn't feel right not to have the base of all base classes available stright out of the starting gate.
I kind lost interest in the other C/MD threads once they balooned past 3-4 pages, but there were many valid ideas in there which act to *reduce* or *limit the scope* of the C/MD even if they don't really eliminate it. And at the end of the day, there really *should* be a C/MD, just as there *should* be full 9th-level casters in the game. Magic is, well, magical, and however puissant a fighter is, he still doesn't have the vast powers of magic at his beck and call. And that's as it should be.
I mean, if you just take the nerf-hammer to all casters and:
- eliminate the most egregious spells from PC access
- eliminate traits which reduce metamagic cost
- limit starting stat maximums for casting stats (and probably all stats while you're at it, just on general anti-min-max principle)
- use a global magic limiting system like the limited magic system in Pathfinder Unchained
- arbitrarily increase casting times for higher-level spells to something like (Spell level/2) in full rounds
...and then give non-casters a few cherries concerning skills and tactics, then the C/MD will fade to the background, even if it doesn't actually disappear.
I for one wouldn't want to do away with full casters, or with the C/MD in its entirety. YMMV.
I guess for me as someone who enjoys playing full casters quite a bit, my question would be if you're taking stuff away from me to make me like all the other 6th level casters, what are you gIvins in return? If you're simply just taking away, well... forget that. Why have the iconic wizard, sorcerer and cleric at all if you're just going to make them cast (the thing the classes I just mentioned are focused on doing) like other classes? Really, it's better for DMs worried about it to just ban full casters in their own games.
I guess I'm decidedly in the camp of "give martials more fun and stuff to do, and don't take away from the other side."
I don't tend to play mundane martials, but not because of the desparity, but because they bore me and aren't very fun for me most of the time.
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Read As: Let's start ANOTHER Caster-Martial Disparity Thread.Why don't you just play E6/E10 and even the board for everybody? It's not a sign of weakness to admit bias against casters and what they are capable of because instead of raw math they have the ability to bypass/alter narrative.
Read as I don't really have anything useful to contribute so I'm going to acridly deride your thought/potential table play exercise via the medium of obtuse misinterpretation and putting words into your mouth without actually offering anything useful to the conversation that I couldn't have just replaced with 'Harumph.. I don't care for it.'
I have seen groups falls hard without full casters, and others have done ok, depending on the group make up. With so many people used to having them, I think as a whole the absence of them would cause a lot more problems than it would solve.
As to any one person's table expect variation.
Does Pathfinder need full martials?
If by Pathfinder you mean a typical party it absolutely, unequivocally, does not.