Fighters that don't suck -- an attempt to make fighters flexible and fun


Homebrew and House Rules

101 to 131 of 131 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | next > last >>

6 people marked this as a favorite.
Firewarrior44 wrote:
I think it's hilarious that in order to swing a second blade around a 3rd time I need 19 Dex, which is the same number of points in intelligence required to cast 9th level spells. Meaning both are apparently of comparable difficulty.

Hah! That's nothing!

You need higher Int to fight defensively than to cast 2nd level spells.

PF is such a caster-friendly game that it's harder to learn how to trip´someone properly than it is to break the laws of physics. :P


3 people marked this as a favorite.
Lemmy wrote:
Firewarrior44 wrote:
I think it's hilarious that in order to swing a second blade around a 3rd time I need 19 Dex, which is the same number of points in intelligence required to cast 9th level spells. Meaning both are apparently of comparable difficulty.

Hah! That's nothing!

You need higher Int to fight defensively than to cast 2nd level spells.

PF is such a caster-friendly game that it's harder to learn how to trip´someone properly than it is to break the laws of physics. :P

Oh wow didn't even think of that. That's fantastic. It's even better as Combat expertise/Improved Trip has no Bab requirement. Also it takes 20% of your feat's to achieve.


Tacticslion wrote:

Alright.

When I've had time and focus, I keep chipping away at this thing.

Fight Good may just break me... but not yet.

So far, I've made it to "F" though I've got to say, doing this has made me realize just how... hm... let's say, "niche" certain feat trees and combinations are. Like, to a confusing degree.

I'm not sure if that's the OP's intent, but it sure does make me want a clarified, streamlined, and simplistic version of the game with shorter feat chains and more optional methods of following them.

Buh. I've gotten up to "G" - it's not that it's so difficult or time consuming to write down so many feats, but the mental focus required to consistently cross-reference prerequisites is... taxing.

"Do I have this? Have I written that down? Is that something I've already noted somewhere? How do I make that kind of note in a simple, semi-consistent way?"

These questions generate... internal resistance from my mind focusing enough to actually do this. I mean, it's also because I'm really busy, and I really, really do not, under any circumstances, want to be stuck "mid-letter" - if I'm somewhere in the middle of a letter, and quit? That's a load of "NOPE" right there.

"G" looks to be relatively short, and "F" was longer than I thought.

So, what does a level one "Fight Good" fighter look like, ignoring all racial, skills and ability score elements?

This:

Not Formatted, Sorry wrote:


Improved Unarmed Strike, Catch Off-Guard, Throw Anything, Equipment Trick
Defensive Combat Training, Agile Maneuvers, Improved Initiative
Amateur (Gunslinger, Swashbuckler)
Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Arc Slinger, Charging Hurler, Improved Charging Hurler
Far Shot
Improved Shield Bash, Crushing Blow
Bleeding Attack, Quick Draw
Blind-Fight
Bloody Vengeance, Death From Above, Desperate Battler
Bludgeoner, Concentrated Splash
Combat Reflexes, Body Guard
Covering Fire, Rapid Reload
Call Out, Chair Breaker, Charging Hurler [Improved Charging Hurler]
Flanking Foil, Focused Discipline, Fortified Armor Training,
Step Up
Weapon Focus (all), Shield Focus, Dazzling Display, Feral Combat Training
Weapon Finesse, Dueling Mastery
Style (Cudgeler, Scorpion)
Cornugon (Shield, Smash, Stun, Trip)
Solo Maneuvers, Friendly-Fire Maneuvers

{Teamwork}
Artillery Team
Choir of Blades
Coordinated (Defense, Distraction, Maneuvers, Shot)
Distracting Charge


2 people marked this as a favorite.

Don't worry Tacticslion, I'm going through all the combat feats and tweaking / removing them (and adding new ones) in the hopes of 1) consolidating unnecessarily long chains and 2) improving the overall power of feats. However I've only made it halfway through C and have already begun questioning my sanity...It comes down to whether a feat deserves to exist as is, as a part of a different feat, or does not at all, with the purpose that feats are to enable various "styles" of character.

Basically, as I see the rules are to provide a way to enable players to bring their concept to life (within the context of adventure tone), with comparable usability. Shortening combat feat chains lets martials (indeed anyone) take the ones necessary for their tricks, and then use the other for non-combat feats (skill effects etc) to make them more rounded.


Yeah, I have that. A battle with sanity, that is.

This is kind of mind-numbing. The weirdness, I mean. The feats don't really seem similar, when they're supposed to and complications - really little-yet-significant ones - seem to proliferate the more I try and find a coherent pattern. Blarg.


Have you seen the variant rules for Stamina Pool and how that can be specifically for a fighter?

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/other-rules/stamina-and-combat-tricks -optional-rules

It's pretty good.

Also don't forget the weapon mastery feats, some of those are really damn good.

Though you may have problems with a PC having "all viable feats".

Perhaps a middle ground between "have all feats" they simply automatically get the feat Barroom Brawler as a bonus feat? And upgrade it periodically as they level up so activate one feat as a swift action and then be able to activate two feats at once with a swift action. and so on. Because there is a problem having "all feats all the time" is that's too many damn effects to keep track of all the time! It becomes a memorization game. Also you run into problems, like how many times do you take Dodge? It's a feat you can take over and over and stacks. So do you have the benefit of Dodge once or 20 times or infinite times?

I appreciate what you're trying to do, but I think it's going to create insurmountable problems for yourself and players.

Or another option, fighter can retrain all his feats EVERY DAY. But it's not such a chore for you or the players to try to remember ALL the possible effects of every feat. Just as casters prepare their new spells every day, a fighter may spend a similar time each morning meditating and practising to re-attune to completely change their lineup of feats. Then you just write down on a post-it note what the feats are. And if you character is ever locked in jail, well I guess he has a training montage as he focuses on becoming the ultimate bare-handed fighter.

Perhaps streamlining is in order. Combine many feats into one so Dirty Trick, Disarm, Steal and Trip are all combined into one feat without an alternate feat pre-requisite of Fighter Level 4 or something. Ditto for forceful manoeuvres Bullrush, Drag, Grapple, Overrun, Reposition, Sunder. And as a little flavour, make Overrun something to perform as part of a move action with a -5 penalty.

Also don't forget the basics. Fighter can do a lot of the debuffs that casters can, often with much more reliability, like they have carry capacity to have a load of Tanglefoot bags.

Fighter can be VEEERY good when played with as much attention to the rules as casters play. Check out all the alchemical items, also cheap magical items. Don't neglect the cheap potions, those are excellent too.

One thing I'm a fan of is allowing personal-only spells as potions, so fighter can drink a potion of Mirror Strike if he is facing many small easy to hit enemies that he can easily overkill, he essentially only has to hit one and then both within reach get hit for half damage. Like a reliable cleave. Check out all the low level spells you can allow fighter to have and use as cheap potions.


GM 1990 wrote:
Atarlost wrote:


Being able to swim or jump isn't on the fighter stuff list.

Having been a soldier since 1988 - I would disagree. Swimming (enough to justify a take-10 in PF) or jumping (enough to get up and over obstacles your own height) are in my experience basic soldier tasks, not just something the special operators do:

Soldier Drown-proof training

Obstacle Course Training

And if you're willing to go "100% and then some, and complete the mission though you be the lone survivor" then even regular Soldiers (in most combat specialties) can apply for and try to graduate from:

Army Ranger Course

Presumably this would represent Human fighters who don't dump Intelligence. With a 12 that would give them 4 skills per level... or 6 for a Lore Warden.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:
GM 1990 wrote:


Swimming (enough to justify a take-10 in PF) or jumping (enough to get up and over obstacles your own height) are in my experience basic soldier tasks, not just something the special operators do:

Soldier Drown-proof training

Obstacle Course Training

Presumably this would represent Human fighters who don't dump Intelligence. With a 12 that would give them 4 skills per level... or 6 for a Lore Warden.

Not really. You only need to be in the 35th percentile of intelligence to enlist in the American army, and, as was said, these are basic soldier tasks.That sounds like dumping intelligence to me.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Orfamay Quest wrote:


Presumably this would represent Human fighters who don't dump Intelligence. With a 12 that would give them 4 skills per level... or 6 for a Lore Warden.

Not really. You only need to be in the 35th percentile of intelligence to enlist in the American army, and, as was said, these are basic soldier tasks.That sounds like dumping intelligence to me.

Technically not that simple, but

Skip unless you're interested in how qualifying for enlistment actually works:

Technically, you have to score a minimum of 31st percentile on the AFQT (compared only to others who've taken the test, not national intelligence/IQ, etc) if you have a HS Diploma, and 50th % with a GED just to meet the regulatory requirement to join. AFQT is a portion of the ASVAB and is generated from questions focused on Paragraph Comprehension, Word Knowledge, Mathematics Knowledge, and Arithmetic Reasoning.

Being eligible, and actually being offered a slot are 2 different things. If you score between 31 and 49th percentile (zone IIIB) you're only going to be offered to enlist if the service is short - its like being in the bottom half of a job interview. Sure...you might fill a niche, but they have a lot of qualified applicants that scored better. 50 AFQT may not even qualify you for Infantry depending on how you scored on other sections of the ASVAB, since the minimum score for 11 series is a 90 CO (Combat).

If you were comparing AFQT percentile to PF, then a 50 AFQT would be an Int of 10 (avg). And 50+ is what most services are typically using for offering enlistments.
Sure a basic footman 0 lvl might be that 31 AFQT guy or gal who got enlisted during time of war, but they're never going to advance to 1st level. Similarly, if there are so many vacancies (and you had the qualifying line scores for those military occupation specialties) that you somehow got in with a 31, you may never pass basic training and AIT. I guess the argument could be made that medieval army and today's army are not comparable in this regard - probably some truth there in the grand scheme. But a 1st Lvl Fighter is already going to be "top tier" compared to local militia and footmen.

Basic soldier task, is a task that every soldier and officer get training on and are supposed to continue to train on their whole career regardless of job. fitness, marksmanship, calling in artillery, map reading, first aid, night-vision and weapon optics devices, Chem/Bio/Nuclear response, recon and reporting information, radio communication use, moving as a patrol member, reacting to near and far contact, etc. If you scored under 50 AFQT you may not pass the tests for these skills no matter how many retraining attempts you get.

My main point was (I think anyway, as this was a few weeks ago) the class skill list for fighters should include some more of the skills that Soldiers are expected to grasp. Leaping/Jumping (Acrobatics); First Aid (Healing); Moving as a patrol member (Stealth); Paying attention to your surroundings/reporting info (Perception). Its why I added all of those to our house-fighter version.


2 people marked this as a favorite.

A couple of points.

1) You're talking about the professional soldiers of today, not the soldiers of a pre-tech era. The intellectual demands of soldiers back then were to know how to march, follow orders, hold a formation, and point your sharpened stick at the enemy without falling over from the weight of your armor.
Only career, military soldiers would have higher demands on their training, especially on the 'skill' side of things. The main focus would be to stay disciplined and in shape and wait for the order to bonk heads.

2)There's a huge difference in knowing the basics of stuff as opposed to knowing the real stuff.

Heal checks, after all, are used to treat diseases. Soldiers are not expected to treat ailments. They are strictly trained in first aid to treat wounds received on a battlefield, and not recovery, therapy or disease treatments.

So, no, it shouldn't be a class skill. I would put it under Profession (soldier)...basic first aid can be attempted with this skill, but not longer/more advanced uses. Being a medic is a whole other field of endeavor even in the military, and that's what real Heal ranks make you.

Likewise, map reading doesn't make you a cartographer. Operating devices doesn't make you an expert on that device (note: Expertise in weapons is proficiency and BAB, NOT skill points), chem/bio/nuc response lets you get the gear on, it does not tell you how to get rid of the problem...or cause the problem in the first place.
Recon/stealth IS an area that requires ever increasing proficiency and its own skill set. Contact protocols and formations are part of your job. These are all basic proficencies modern soldiers have to have, not really 'skill ranks'. I'm not even sure they are worth 1 skill point.

So, I believe most 'skills' being covered here could be put under the broad list of 'profession: Soldier', since many of them represent grab bags of very low level skill uses of a broad area of skills. Soldiers tend to acquire broad competency at a lot of stuff, but not become experts in very many...just like normal people. They know the basics of doing their job, and THEN they get to be real good at the assigned MOS.

All of this is very similar to how you can use Profession (sailor) for most naval-based checks, instead of Rope Use, Balance, Climb, Navigation, and similar things when aboard a ship. Profession (soldier) would fill in for basic skill checks needed for soldiers. Note the Int requirement, too!


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Ranishe wrote:

Don't worry Tacticslion, I'm going through all the combat feats and tweaking / removing them (and adding new ones) in the hopes of 1) consolidating unnecessarily long chains and 2) improving the overall power of feats. However I've only made it halfway through C and have already begun questioning my sanity...It comes down to whether a feat deserves to exist as is, as a part of a different feat, or does not at all, with the purpose that feats are to enable various "styles" of character.

Basically, as I see the rules are to provide a way to enable players to bring their concept to life (within the context of adventure tone), with comparable usability. Shortening combat feat chains lets martials (indeed anyone) take the ones necessary for their tricks, and then use the other for non-combat feats (skill effects etc) to make them more rounded.

Tacticslion wrote:


Yeah, I have that. A battle with sanity, that is.

This is kind of mind-numbing. The weirdness, I mean. The feats don't really seem similar, when they're supposed to and complications - really little-yet-significant ones - seem to proliferate the more I try and find a coherent pattern. Blarg.

I've done something similar. I changed feats to be a point-buy-like system. The way I made it manageable is to go through them by source. I started with the CRB and my system is now usable, even though I am not done, instead of just having A-F.


Lets just look at magical defences.

This is a careful area to buff as this is kind of their Achilles heel, their kryptonite, while they are great at conventional attacks they aren't that great with magic. Except caster very quickly get VERY hard counters to melee attacks and fighters just cannot keep up. Not only can they not be seen but get huge damage reductions or even damage negation. However it's not so much an achillies heel as an achillies entire surface area as at higher levels such devastating spells start appearing all the damn time.

I'd warn off on Spell Resistance, it's a bad idea as it makes it way too damn hard to get buffs which are pretty critical to making fighter competitive. because spell resistance unfortunately works even against beneficial buffing spells unless you spend a standard action to turn it off.

Advanced Weapon Training gives nice options like able to add Bravery bonus to ALL will saves. But it's pretty late in the game you can get that and it's just too damn fluky. If you fail the save. You. Are. Dead. Either give it sooner or give it for free. Though that's going to still leave you far behind compared to not only the saves of wizard but typical DC of a Level 4 spell with typical int-bonus which will be DC19, easily.

A nice simple trick would be to tweak Ring of Counterspelling so you can load it with Dispel Magic, normally it will only dispel if the exact same spell that is cast into it is cast on the ring wearer. It wouldn't be a guaranteed defence but it would be a nice layer of defence.

Many of the nastiest spells are targeted, so one of the first layers of defence is "don't get hit". Yeah, buff touch AC, easier said than done. However, Mirror Image treats each mirror-duplicate as a separate fake target. There's a legit way to do this, get Symbol of Mirroring activated by touch and have it in your pocket or something, just touch it and you've got one mirror duplicate. A homebrew solution is to allow Personal-only spells to be in Potions, then they can easily get Mirror Image with many more copies. Remember, each copy is only lost if hit, and each copy is only hit if it matches or exceeds your FULL AC!

So, high saves, counterspelling, don't get hit, still not enough.

The trait Second Chance is a heck of a good spell as it allows (once per day) to re-roll any failed saves. This is a really good extra layer of protection as if you only need a 6 or higher to succeed the save-or-die check then your failure rate goes from 25% to only 6.25%. Math. Re-rolls are the key when you've got good odds of making the save but the stakes are too high. But remember, re-rolls are worth it with a high chance of success. If you are failing 80% of rolls then a re-roll will only improve your odds to 64%.

The thing is that this should all be a backup, the best form of defence is attack, the Achilles heel of casters is their vulnerability to attack. To an extent this is down to needing a good archer with a readied action to shoot when they see a caster. They are likely hiding by invisibility but their spell ends when they cast an offensive spell. That's when they have to be attacked, this is where a dedicated ranged attacker can come in so useful.

Black tentacles may seem evil, but it's actually playing to your strengths. Fighter CMD can be really high, put it higher with Alchemical Grease and similar items.

The many pits depend on reflex save which shouldn't be so bad, but you still may fail it. Being a generous GM you could give a further save based on how you aren't falling off the side of a flat cliff but into a hole with edges. The climb rules for catching yourself while falling are normally impossible (regular climb DC +20) but to catch yourself against a slope is only DC10. So even if they fail the reflex save they may still grab the ledge and just be hanging by their fingernails.

Failing that, use items like Talisman of beneficial Winds and use the high Caster Level against them. These pits are usually only dangerous at the bottom whereby the Talisman of beneficial Winds grants you featherfall if you fall more than 5ft. You fall 60ft per round but to avoid landing in, say, the acid at the bottom of an acid pit, you should have your turn before you've fallen even that far. Without even needing homebrew, on your turn throw a spider-sac attached to a contracting rope, you can easily get back out. With a little bit of homebrew you could rule on how Featherfall works in actually making the target at light as a feather, they can float back out by activating a Buoyant Balloon which lifts 20lbs of "weight". Slippers of Spider Climb make it easy to grab the wall and climb back out but you could rule that as being Gloves of Spider Climb instead.

If they use Bestow Curse on you, make sure you have a Potion of Abeyance in your back pocket to delay it for 24 hours, more than enough to win the fight and get out to somewhere where someone can cast Remove Curse on you.

Don't worry too much about blasting spells, 1d6 per level of something like fireball may seem like a lot but all levels being equal you should have about 1d10+3 hp per level and you're likely to make the reflex save for half. Get spells like Resist Energy, with CL7 and Alchemical Reagent Liquid Ice you get Fire Resistance 24. This means you can very easily take a direct hit by a MAXIMIZED fireball and with a reflex save and Resist energy take only 6 points of fire damage. After that, charge the caster who attacked you.

Have things like Padzahr for dealing with CloudKill and other constitution draining spells. If you have a potion of Delay Poison you can make yourself immune to cloudkill as it's a poison effect but you'd have to do it as cloudkill is closing in. Anti-toxin also helps with the save as even though it's a spell it's poison type.

Remember to take a potion of Protection From Evil to protect from evil summons and as a hard counter against spells like Dominate Person.

Elemental Breath (alchemical item) counters Suffocation spell as elemental breath means you simply don't need to breathe.

If they have ammunition smeared with Spellscorch then that's really stacking odds against the caster. If the ammunition they were hit with has the Distracting quality that's another layer of favourable odds.

Remember magic items like Staggerproof Boots let you move 30ft as an IMMEDIATE Action so when a wizard de-cloaks to cast a spell, move into position and he provokes. He already started casting the spell without casting defensively so he is pretty much guaranteed to provoke. Reach can help close the distance with the 25 +5ft/2 level ranged spells.

Arguably the fighter doesn't need the buff here, casters just need a nerf. The problem is that concentration checks are too easy at higher levels and could be changed:

Cast defensively goes from 15+ 2x spell level to DC15 + Spell Level SQUARED. Low level spells are actually easier but high levels are exponentially harder.

Injury save goes from DC 10 + damage + spell level to DC = damage multiplied by spell level.

And to make things a bit more in combative's favour, casters are flat footed when they cast a spell.

It's ridiculous that the main counter to casters is so likely to fail. If you're casting a 7th level spell and get hit for with 4 heavy crossbow bolts for 20 damage, the caster needs to only roll a 10 to still cast the spell as normal. Fecking ridiculous. Considering the damage reductions that casters can give themselves and how they can have such high AC you might not want to use things like power attack you can't even dump much damage into them.

Even if a top level caster was casting even a 5th level spell, they should need a natural 20 to be able to retain focus while taking 10 damage which is the average of being hit by two heavy crossbow bolts.


Just a note: A Fighter is less likely to make a reflex save then a Will save under the current rules, largely because he doesn't invest in his Reflex save.

A mage casting a Fireball has the same DC as casting Hold Person. The only difference is if the Wizard invests in feats that raise the save DC. usually Reflex saves don't kill outright, but that might not be true with Created Pits and truly skilled DDamage-dealers. Furthermore, resistances cost money, and personal spells are house rules, not rules, as potions.

If you are no longer falling, feather falling does not work. If you stop falling or rise, the spell will go away. It's feather falling, at 60 ft/rd, not feather drifting.


Das Bier wrote:

A couple of points.

1) You're talking about the professional soldiers of today, not the soldiers of a pre-tech era. The intellectual demands of soldiers back then were to know how to march, follow orders, hold a formation, and point your sharpened stick at the enemy without falling over from the weight of your armor.
Only career, military soldiers would have higher demands on their training, especially on the 'skill' side of things. The main focus would be to stay disciplined and in shape and wait for the order to bonk heads.

2)There's a huge difference in knowing the basics of stuff as opposed to knowing the real stuff.

Heal checks, after all, are used to treat diseases. Soldiers are not expected to treat ailments. They are strictly trained in first aid to treat wounds received on a battlefield, and not recovery, therapy or disease treatments.

So, no, it shouldn't be a class skill. I would put it under Profession (soldier)...basic first aid can be attempted with this skill, but not longer/more advanced uses. Being a medic is a whole other field of endeavor even in the military, and that's what real Heal ranks make you.

Likewise, map reading doesn't make you a cartographer. Operating devices doesn't make you an expert on that device (note: Expertise in weapons is proficiency and BAB, NOT skill points), chem/bio/nuc response lets you get the gear on, it does not tell you how to get rid of the problem...or cause the problem in the first place.
Recon/stealth IS an area that requires ever increasing proficiency and its own skill set. Contact protocols and formations are part of your job. These are all basic proficencies modern soldiers have to have, not really 'skill ranks'. I'm not even sure they are worth 1 skill point.

So, I believe most 'skills' being covered here could be put under the broad list of 'profession: Soldier', since many of them represent grab bags of very low level skill uses of a broad area of skills. Soldiers tend to acquire broad competency at a lot of stuff, but not...

I can't argue strongly with any of this, except to say my thought is only that some of these other skills should be class skills as IMO they apply to "soldier/fighter" as part of their daily duties. Where as Profession (Soldier) wouldn't be incorrect either, the skill checks would get that +3 bonus. Its not that fighters are prohibited from taking ranks in Heal, just not getting that +3 bonus when they do. Disease is just part of it, first aid, treat deadly wounds, treat poison, treat caltrops.

It is a different profession today than 500 years ago to be sure. As far as that goes, the few developed nations that have professional militaries do it different than the rest of the world, and the US does it different than even many of those with volunteers only, investment in professional development (both officers and NCO's) and obviously technology. Its one of the reason that below 50 AFQT is unlikely to get you an actual enlistment offer unless recruiting and retention is really tanking - even light infantry has so many gadgets now you need to be at least "average" intelligence. I have run across a couple of "Lenny" types since joining in '88 - None of them were higher rank than E4 (non-leadership blue-collar workers). I'll also say I'm amazed almost every day at the caliber of young men and women who join the Army - you're not going to get rich and it is an inherently dangerous job, even in training, but 99% of them are great American doing it because they want to make a difference.


Providing First Aid is a DC 15 check. Even with the profession bonus, a soldier is not likely to be able to take 10 and make that check until level 2...and level 2 is a fairly experienced soldier. Treating deadly wounds is DC 20...you're either going to be a medic or a very experienced soldier to be able to deal with that level of injury, and I can see not including it at all.

So, being able to do first aid, and possibly even treating deadly wounds, I can see with Profession (Soldier), and yes, getting the bonus, because they are going to run into first aid situations ALL THE TIME as fighting folk...they'll get the exposure and need to use it.

The rest of the heal abilities? Not really. Basic hygiene and avoidign sources of disease is not the same as knowing how to treat malaria. that's what they have medics for.

Likewise, let's not ignore the elephant in the room...knowledge checks of enemies. Professional soldiers need to know heraldry and rank heirarchies, and in a magical world, would substitute knowing monsters for knowing enemy equipment and gear. IF you fight monsters, you are going to know what works against them and what does not. You'll probably get obsessive over it, as every bit of data is one more thing you prepare for if you get into a fight. Fighting folk will talk to one another about what X monster did, and how they beat it, and pass the knowledge on as surely as stances, strikes and guard maneuvers with their weapons.


Are we really arguing that fighter getting more than 2 skill points per level is totally unacceptable? Wow, what do you really think will happen if they get more than that? 4 skill points is easily more than enough, that's still half of what Rogue gets. No one can prove how a Fighter with 4 skill points per level breaks the game.

Anyway: Movement Options.

This seems most obvious to me in how there are loads of physical obstructions and so many means that by magic they can be overcome. Things like difficult terrain, pits, caltrops, pressure pad traps. All easily bypassed with flight. Which is kinda hard to do without magic. Also teleporting all over the damn place.

BTW: a Potion of Feather Step for only 50gp gives you 10 minutes of ignoring difficult terrain, that includes charging and feather step. Anyone can drink that. But what if you don't have time to drink it or you've run out?

One way fighters could usually bypass this was to become a ranged focused class so they don't have to fly over anywhere, they can just keep blatting away with arrows/bolts. Not always the preferred option though. One thing that can really help is to allow more jumps. Using acrobatics to jump can be amazingly powerful, remember that the number on the Acrobatics check is equal to the distance you are horizontally able to cover in a jump, this easily clears pits, caltrops, difficult terrain.

A catch all cover for this would be LITERALLY increasing movement speed, Creatures with a base land speed above 30 feet receive a +4 racial bonus on Acrobatics checks made to jump for every 10 feet of their speed above 30 feet. So if you could grant the ability of a spell like Expeditious Retreat to grant 60ft base movement speed they can almost guarantee to jump 20ft and make 30ft more often than not. I know, this isn't as good as flying but simply giving them the power of flight isn't very good either.

As a GM you need to make accommodations as if you make all things equal then fighters end up unable to compete. One great thing about setting things underground or in castles is the ceilings can be low enough that even flying beings can still be hit by at least reach melee attacks. That's what's so devastating about flight, the ability to get above over things and be immune. At least tip off fighters to overhead cover, like a forest with many overhead trees.

I am always a fan of Staggerproof Boots, being able to stand up without provoking is so damn handy considering the dangers of being tripped or knocked down by so many things.

Recovery/immunity:

This again can be covered by item drops. Poison Ward Salve, Anti-toxin, Anti-plague. Look through the Alchemical items on places like Archiveofnethys.com I found that Potions of Cure Light wounds and Troll Styptic cover health point recovery well. Pahzadar for constitution damage. And get use dragoncrafting for recovering negative levels.

Boulderhead Bock is really good for buffs and all those easy Temporary hitpoints that only apply for nonleathal damage. Combo with Buffering Cap to cover critical hits counter.

Take a look at items like Patternward Spectacles, those are a great drop and with buffs can give great immunities.

Skill points:

Plenty of people will object but certainly fighter getting more skill points per level would do more good than harm. Even 4 skill points per level that's still half of what a rogue gets and Monk gets 50% more. The suggestion that Fighter should aim for Int 12 and/or give up the favoured class bonus to HP for a skill point is going to leave fighter far worse off than the likes of Wizards that can dump wis for int as they have a high will save and get more skill points than they know what to spend them on.

One idea i've been pitching around is letting fighter choose which skills are class skills, but with some limitation. Like they cannot pick spellcraft or something totally irrelevant to being a fighter like that.

Advanced Weapons Training gives the option of your Fighter levels being ranks for several skills, but you get it SO DAMN LATE!

Out of combat:

Other than my suggestion of the ability to re-train feats every day like a wizard prepares spells, fighter still needs other things to do, particularly in downtime. Casters have magical item crafting which is essentially totally out of the reach of non-casters like Fighters. I think the solution should be in crafting, it should be way easier to craft but in time and required checks. I have had it be essentially the same as magical crafting, you just need to make the DC of the check and you can make up to 200gp's worth of progress in an 8 hour work day. Casters still have a huge lead about to make 2000gp of progress per day but they need feats and CL requirements.

Non-magical items can be hugely valuable, especially if you only count self-crafted items as 1/4th their regular wealth against their wealth per level.


Das Bier wrote:

Just a note: A Fighter is less likely to make a reflex save then a Will save under the current rules, largely because he doesn't invest in his Reflex save.

A mage casting a Fireball has the same DC as casting Hold Person. The only difference is if the Wizard invests in feats that raise the save DC. usually Reflex saves don't kill outright, but that might not be true with Created Pits and truly skilled DDamage-dealers. Furthermore, resistances cost money, and personal spells are house rules, not rules, as potions.

If you are no longer falling, feather falling does not work. If you stop falling or rise, the spell will go away. It's feather falling, at 60 ft/rd, not feather drifting.

Yeah, you're right, I always thought Burst of Radiance was better because so many big mobs have terrible reflex saves, often due to their size they have low if not negative dex. Though this then becomes of dubious use as it hardly makes them any easier to hit and just buys you time as the 3 ogres you easily blinded fumble around.

What do you think about a second save against pits? Both the reflex save to hop out of the way and grab the slopped edge as you fall?

I think the key to countering things like hold person is how you get both a save when cast and every time on your turn, the trick is to make the save before a creature can perform a coup de grace on you. That's the thing, you've really got to stop that coup de grace. One tactic I've rarely been able to get off the ground either by encouragement or organise as a player is a floating-disk platform. If a fighter is on a floating disk and is shadowed to an invisible Wizard then the wizard can walk into position and move the fighter through areas where Fighter would otherwise provoke AoO and then after the wizard's turn the fighter gets a full round attack. And if the fighter is paralysed then the wizard can just run out of there with the Fighter floated out with him. All this time wizard would be casting summons or buffing spells.

I think one counter against all the various forms of paralysis, blindness and so on is to give fighter some things he can activate.

This is why I'm a huge fan of a houserule for Personal spells being allowable in potions as then GM could drop potions of Surmount Affliction, which though expensive at 300gp it's a 100% guarantee to end things like Blinded, Dazzled, Confused and Paralysed. But how do you drink a potion while paralysed? You can perform any mental action when paralysed, that's what fighter needs, some way to invest some defence against paralysis that is activated mentally.

Sipping Jacket theoretically is activated mentally but this is all getting way too damn expensive and prescriptive. How do you get spell or effects which replicates spells like that in on someone who is paralysed to stop them being Coup De Graced?

What's a catch-all defence other than GM holding back A LOT.

Dare I say it is the solution... teamwork?


Nobody was arguing about the fighter getting more skill points. I was pointing out that many of the skills with potential designation as class skills have basic uses that fall under the Profession: Soldier heading, but their advanced uses are quite inappropriate.

It might be more appropriate to simply delineate what Profession: Solder enables you to do from a martial standpoint.

Increased movement options are logical and powerful for martials. If you want to go into anime levels of jumping, that's not inappropriate at higher levels, either.

Designating items to cover weaknesses in recovery is a bandage for the class. either the class has options to recover something, or they have to spend gold. That's exactly the difference here.

As for saving throws...you're basically giving a double save out for a problem spell. Just give a better save out. Logically, fighters are not people flexing mental muscle. People want a better will save for them because Will saves are dangerous, and Reflex saves are much less so. But a fighter is a physical combatant, not a mental one, and he should have a Good Fort and Reflex save. If he wants a good Will save, he should indeed spend something for it...but he should at least be able to rival what a barbarian can do, and it took too bloodly long for that to become a possibility...and still doesn't rival what Superstition can do.

Teamwork is like magic items...what happens when you have a random team, or don't have enough team, or the team lets you down? The fighter's big problem now is that at letter levels, he can't contribute to the team at all...he drags the team down, rather then helping prop them up, he's a net taker, not contributor. Give him some ability to stand on his own, without sucking from the group, and then teamwork starts becoming really effective.


Das Bier wrote:
I was pointing out that many of the skills with potential designation as class skills have basic uses that fall under the Profession: Soldier heading...

You're the only person I've seen claim professions do anything useful other than day job checks and very limited knowledge with the exceptions of specific uses in the ship handling and army rules. At 99% of tables the GM is going to say "if you want to treat deadly wounds you need to take the skill for treating deadly wounds."


I just came upon this thread.

Might I suggest having a look at this?


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Atarlost wrote:
You're the only person I've seen claim professions do anything useful other than day job checks and very limited knowledge with the exceptions of specific uses in the ship handling and army rules. At 99% of tables the GM is going to say "if you want to treat deadly wounds you need to take the skill for treating deadly wounds."

This idea was highlighted in 3.5 description of the skill : "For example, a sailor knows how to tie several basic knots, how to tend and repair sails, and how to stand a deck watch at sea. The DM sets DCs for specialized tasks."

This specific part of the skill description was removed in PF.

In theory, Profession could (should) be usable for any basic task relating to the profession (the 3.5 examples did show the ability to use profession(sailor) in place of Use Rope and Craft).
In practice, unless a list of what can be done with a specific profession is made, with in which cases a profession can replace another skill, then a GM rarely allows for that kind of things.

I feel profession was a nice idea that never were given the opportunity to grow.


Das Bier wrote:

Increased movement options are logical and powerful for martials. If you want to go into anime levels of jumping, that's not inappropriate at higher levels, either.

Designating items to cover weaknesses in recovery is a bandage for the class. either the class has options to recover something, or they have to spend gold. That's exactly the difference here.

I think it's important to go over items to get a baseline of what we need to get where we should be, how you can get there just by forking out and an idea of balancing the breadth, depth and longevity of any new abilities. Particularly, how good it is to get a boost to movement speed.

Maybe an expansions on Stamina Pool rules to allows things like +30ft enhancement to movement speed for one round. It's not something a fighter would need every round as if fighter gets into a good position to full attack then extra base movement speed is fairly redundant.

"Just give a better save out."

Part of me resists that, I feel it's becoming a +1-1 game, I do like (as someone suggested) the idea of having the bonus from Bravery apply to both Will saves and Reflex saves as you level up but the problem is that even with a high save it's not enough. It take A LOT to try to get your saves high enough to get just a 75% success rate, say if you somehow managed to get a +10 against a DC16 save-or-die/suck effect d20 6-20 is a success, 1-5 is failure. With such high stakes, 1-5 is still too likely. I'd say even with the quirks of probability even improving saving rolls AND reducing DCs is not going to be enough.

This is where double-saves make the difference. Changing extremely risky saves into probably-gonna-make-it saves.

What I like about multiple layers of saves is you have degrees-of-screwed. If you make the initial save, great, you actually get some free movement out of the way of the hole. Fail the reflex save and grab the ledge you are in a precarious situation of hanging on the edge of a ledge into a pit of spikes or acid, and a hungry hole will take one bite of you if you don't get out on the next turn. But it's not so bad. Fail both and you have cheap contingencies for falling.

It's becoming apparent to me that it might be easier to houserule nerfs to magic that limits the higher level spells. I'm talking about things like how the spell DC is calculated, maybe it should have some limiting factor like the spell DC can never be higher than their mental ability score used for that spell. Limit it kind of like max dex bonus on armour.

"But a fighter is a physical combatant, not a mental one"

And there's no point in getting into a fruitless disagreement about how willful a soldier can be or how important it is to fight war with intelligence and cunning rather than the rounded up like wild animals, but for the simple balance reason that physical combat can so easily be totally avoided by so many threats. The point is that a fighter could be as willful as a Wizard and probably should as a fighter probably needs it more as well.

But even in keeping with that, how is this for an ability:

Reflex Response (Ex)
By spending a full round action, a fighter may prepare themselves with a Ready Action that they retain for the next hour. This Reflex Response is a special action that taps into their base fighting instinct so bypasses charms, compulsions and similar mental effects which may inhibit action such as by paralysis or confusion. The trigger may be anything as specified by Ready Action but if they do not take the action the action is not lost. After they take the Reflex Response they are staggered on their next turn, unless they did not move or fight on their previous turn. After they have used a Reflex Response or an hour has passed they must spend another Full Round readying a new Reflex Response.

Or something like that.

Yeah, that is kinda good. But I think it has to be to deal with the horrific things thrown at Fighters. It means they can actually do something about all these things that try to mentally confound them. It's also pretty generally useful though what level should a fighter get something like this?

I realise this is really powerful as they can ready a move action to dive out of the path of a Fireball. Attack anyone trying to perform a Coup De Grace when paralysed, or even drink a potion that would remove the paralysis.

"Teamwork is like magic items...what happens when you have a random team, or don't have enough team, or the team lets you down?"

Yeah, only happens about 95% of the time... [[cries deeply]]

"The fighter's big problem now is that at letter levels, he can't contribute to the team at all...he drags the team down, rather then helping prop them up, he's a net taker, not contributor."

It's hard to see how a fighter even could contribute while still being a fighter.

One argument is that if a caster really wants to stay protected then they stay invisible, but to stay invisible they cannot cast harmful spells. So arguably this did make fighters useful in being the ideal target for buff spells. That's not really dragging to team down for the wizard to unlock amazing potential.

It's only considered "dragging the team down" to "lift a fighter up" because 95% of the time people are total jerks and 95% of the time have next-to-zero concept of teamwork. Their idea of "teamwork" is "I'm going to do my thing, you're going to do your thing, and if you aren't as good as me then you're dragging the team down".

They are too selfish minded to consider the utility of a spell that buffs because all they see is "I'm giving up a standard action I could use to cast blasting spells!"

The idea of "he's a net taker, not contributor" is the de-valuing of attacks that are not their own.

"Give him some ability to stand on his own, without sucking from the group, and then teamwork starts becoming really effective."

This to me smacks of contradictions. Stand on his own? Teamwork?

Isn't teamwork far more about working as a TEAM, as in standing together rather than as separate individuals? Teamwork means more than just "everyone better do good" it means things like if there's a 12 foot high wall instead of two people both trying equally hard to jump 6ft vertically, one stands on the other's shoulders to reach the top then once one is at the top the other lowers their hand to help pull the other up.

But if you mean Fighter needs too much of a leg up for simple things I will say what I said before: allow personal-only spells in potions and drop a heck of a lot of them. So many things to bring fighter ahead are in simple low level potions that wouldn't be worth the time and bother to cast on them. Mirror Strike can be a great spell for a reach fighter to get when you're being swarmed by lots of small weak opponents.


Ghray wrote:
+1 bonus is something that you seriously might forget that you even have. Having one more +1 bonus doesn’t make your character unique, it makes you a sucker for spending one of the half dozen feats you’ll ever see on a bonus the other players won’t even mention when discussing your character.

Do you think combining feats from a Feat Tree into one feat will be enough?

So taking Combat Expertise you get also:
-Improved Trip
-Improved Disarm
-Improved Steal
-Improved Feint
-Improved Dirty Trick
-Gang Up

Ans so on, and as they go up on BAB they get more unlocks like Greater Trip.

Similar setup with Power Attack get:
-Cleave
-Improved Bullrush/grapple/Overrun/Sunder
-Pushing Assault

Then as BAB goes up unlocking Cleaving Finish, Greater Cleave, Furious Focus, Greater Bullrush and so on.

Dodge gets mobility, Disorienting Maneuver and so on then getting spring attack with BAB later on.


Atarlost wrote:
Das Bier wrote:
I was pointing out that many of the skills with potential designation as class skills have basic uses that fall under the Profession: Soldier heading...
You're the only person I've seen claim professions do anything useful other than day job checks and very limited knowledge with the exceptions of specific uses in the ship handling and army rules. At 99% of tables the GM is going to say "if you want to treat deadly wounds you need to take the skill for treating deadly wounds."

I have no problem with deadly wounds remaining a Heal skill.

But everyone says fighters should know basic first aid. That's not the heal skill, that's basic first aid that a trained combatant should know. It falls under a Profession check. Saying every fighter should have the easy potential of being a surgeon is a little crazy.

Fighters don't have strong will saves because they do battle physically, they don't slam their minds and faith into problems like wizards and clerics do. They are in marvelous physical shape. They should have good Fort and Reflex saves, period. You can't even argue the armor angle...they specifically train so they can reduce armor penalties and move faster in armor. That's AGILITY training.

If they want a good Will save, they should need to invest in it, stepping outside the realm of physical battle to train in mental defense.

Which is taking a feat to me: Iron Will: +2 to Will saves. If you have Bravery, this bonus is increased by your Bravery bonus.

the fighter has committed to mental defense, and he's better at it then another class who spent a feat to take it. He's a master of feats...makes sense, satisfies the paradigm, and gives him effectively a Good Will Save.

Armed Bravery, the AWT option, does almost the same thing, but you get a smaller bonus for effectively the same cost, and AWT feats are restricted in number.

Improved Bravery has a Charisma requirement which is the dump stat for fighters. Absolutely crazy, who thought that one up?


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Hey guys, remember what Chris Lambertz said earlier in this thread:

Chris Lambertz wrote:
Removed a series of posts. Folks, don't derail someone else's homebrew solution thread into a discussion solely about your own (a new thread or taking it to an existing thread is more appropriate). Also, back and forth bickering helps no conversation—flag and move on.

The OP made a very specific proposal.


Welp. Up to "I"...

That's enough for tonight.


Blarg!

Update!

... I'm back up to "D"... for dag-nabbit! >:I

C'mon, dude! Just... PM me, when you update combat feats, from now on.

Please.

As a personal favor...

XI

FOR MY OWN RECORDS:
- currently rechecking, got up to D
- previously, got up to I

NOTE: I badly mis-charted where a few feats go. I'm not entirely sure how. It was probably a case of Microsoft's wonky interface thing, where I was alternating between searches and names and when I went to type a few things they all ended up in the same place instead of where I wanted and I was just tired enough not to notice. Not entirely sure how I could have categorized "Medusa's Wrath" as a Teamwork feat, otherwise. Hmp. I'll have to check just the Teamwork feats after finally finishing the list...


Tacticslion wrote:

C'mon, dude! Just... PM me, when you update combat feats, from now on.

Please.

As a personal favor...

XI

Okay, for the really-real official record, I just want to say that I have zero expectation of the guy actually PMing me. He has no reason to do so. While he frequents these forums, and is a really cool guy over-all, he has little reason to know who I am, much less that I'm doing an obscure side-project that relies on him putting aside very real time and effort from his extremely busy day PMing me each time he updates combat feats.

I'd not turn it down if he did so, hint-hint*, but I have no illusions or expectations that such a thing will happen. Guy's busy, and doesn't owe anyone anything, considering how much work he puts into maintaining the site!

* This is a jo- I say, a joke, son!**
** As is that Froghorn Leghorn accent!


I would consider all fighter prerequisite feats do not count against the total feats allowed. They are of course prerequisite feats because other feats were taken.

I have no problem setting the fighters class skills at fighter level, then +int bonus if positive + all other bonuses for race or whatever.

This will be for games I'm GMing. Other things such as weapons blessed by Gorum will grant fighters 3 true strikes a day, with that weapon. Fighter like classes will gain only one true strike a day, but they can have more than one blessed weapon.

Shields can have the shield spell as a quality. Magic missile will cancel out that quality for the day. Thus a buckler when used will have the magical shield hovering over it's surface. It will stop the first magic missile that day.

Note in my game you cannot hold a shield with your arm or whatever and not be wielding it.

You can use these ideas or not.


Tacticslion wrote:

Blarg!

Update!

... I'm back up to "D"... for dag-nabbit! >:I

C'mon, dude! Just... PM me, when you update combat feats, from now on.

Please.

As a personal favor...

XI

FOR MY OWN RECORDS:
- currently rechecking, got up to D
- previously, got up to I

NOTE: I badly mis-charted where a few feats go. I'm not entirely sure how. It was probably a case of Microsoft's wonky interface thing, where I was alternating between searches and names and when I went to type a few things they all ended up in the same place instead of where I wanted and I was just tired enough not to notice. Not entirely sure how I could have categorized "Medusa's Wrath" as a Teamwork feat, otherwise. Hmp. I'll have to check just the Teamwork feats after finally finishing the list...

FINISHED WITH "I" TONIGHT! "I" was a fair beast, but it wasn't quite as bad as I'd thought.

So far, I've gotten up to "J" - that's letter 10 of 26, and - in the case of the feat list, at least - looks to be either just-at, or slightly further than half-way through! Woohoo!


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Kind of "re-dotting" to find this thread later, as I'm closing it and it's in danger of getting lost in my own posts. Whoops!

101 to 131 of 131 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | next > last >>
Community / Forums / Pathfinder / Pathfinder First Edition / Homebrew and House Rules / Fighters that don't suck -- an attempt to make fighters flexible and fun All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.
Recent threads in Homebrew and House Rules
Continents and Oceans.