Pseudostatistical analysis of martial-caster disparity


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion

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Das Bier wrote:
wraithstrike wrote:
Das Bier wrote:

Aye, Anti-magic Shells are useless unless you can force a caster into the shell. And that area is SMALL.

Spell Engine has a huge area, and you can make it nigh impossible for a caster NOT to enter the area of effect.

It's just such magic is too pricey for NPC's to use on a broad scale, when in actuality it should be pretty cheap and common. Wards and similar magical defenses are VERY common in literature, I don't know why they are so expensive in PF. Let casters labor under penalties, and rogues have a place to shrine.

IMC, spell engines are everywhere, restricting any spellcasters not sworn to the service of the city. Urban areas are the playgrounds of rogues and martials. Casters have to invest heavily in magical items of defense because they can't cast such spells themselves, have bodyguards, etc.

Not having spells makes the party weaker, and it you are a druid,or other fighty caster then you might still be able to give the melees a run for their money.

For the 2nd time in this discussion➡➡full arcane casters are not the only ones stepping on people's toes.

Well, duh, Wraithstrike.

It also makes NPC's weaker. Now, we have equity. In some situations spellcasters will be uninhibited and more effective then mundanes. In other situations, Casters will be suppressed and skills and fighty guys will shine. Tellingly, urban campaigns will favor skill, and rural adventures favor casters.

It makes monsters somewhat more dangerous in cities, because they are 'naturally buffed'. But then martial skill becomes even more important as long as the monsters can't cast, either.

Or the group could come to a better answer that makes more sense thematically. Casters are likely the ones creating these things, and I really doubt they are going to limit themselves like that without some way to bypass it.

In addition, other than GM Fiat there is no reason they(anti magic thingy) can't be destroyed. So the party would likely make that a goal. A caster can call things at least 3 levels above the party APL. This keeps the party strong and stops the player form having to sit around, for what amounts to hours in real life doing basically nothing. Unless of course the GM says it is an NPC and he doesn't let the player control it. In that case the smart thing to do if these anti-caster machines can't be destroyed is not be stupid and try to enter combat as a commoner. Its not like he is adding to the combat anyway, and any smart enemy will try to kill him while he has no magic. <---only for full arcane casters and spell based clerics<insert other class as needed> who are not built to fight

NPC 1: Isn't that the guy who turned Tom to stone 3 weeks ago?

NPC 2: Yeah. Let's kill him first.

Liberty's Edge

Yes, there is a major disparity.

I'm still discounting that analysis from way upthread just because a lot of the obituaries I posted were extremely s+$@ luck or blatant stupidity on the group's part. (Plus Ziggy lost his character sheet in one of the Jade Regent deaths.)


Anzyr wrote:
Das Bier wrote:

Aye, Anti-magic Shells are useless unless you can force a caster into the shell. And that area is SMALL.

Spell Engine has a huge area, and you can make it nigh impossible for a caster NOT to enter the area of effect.

It's just such magic is too pricey for NPC's to use on a broad scale, when in actuality it should be pretty cheap and common. Wards and similar magical defenses are VERY common in literature, I don't know why they are so expensive in PF. Let casters labor under penalties, and rogues have a place to shrine.

IMC, spell engines are everywhere, restricting any spellcasters not sworn to the service of the city. Urban areas are the playgrounds of rogues and martials. Casters have to invest heavily in magical items of defense because they can't cast such spells themselves, have bodyguards, etc.

I have bad news. That only works in 3.0. The 3.5 version of Spell Engine only allows a caster instantly to swap spells prepared for other spells from their spellbook.

actually it's a 1e spell originally. You can see it in the first or second spellfire novel, where it almost eats the spellfire wielder alive. I just liked the idea so much I yoinked it.

It got severely nerfed in area of effect in later versions, and basically was just a thing you could cast a magic missile at and then prepare spells in half the time...totally useless.


wraithstrike wrote:
Das Bier wrote:
wraithstrike wrote:
Das Bier wrote:

Aye, Anti-magic Shells are useless unless you can force a caster into the shell. And that area is SMALL.

Spell Engine has a huge area, and you can make it nigh impossible for a caster NOT to enter the area of effect.

It's just such magic is too pricey for NPC's to use on a broad scale, when in actuality it should be pretty cheap and common. Wards and similar magical defenses are VERY common in literature, I don't know why they are so expensive in PF. Let casters labor under penalties, and rogues have a place to shrine.

IMC, spell engines are everywhere, restricting any spellcasters not sworn to the service of the city. Urban areas are the playgrounds of rogues and martials. Casters have to invest heavily in magical items of defense because they can't cast such spells themselves, have bodyguards, etc.

Not having spells makes the party weaker, and it you are a druid,or other fighty caster then you might still be able to give the melees a run for their money.

For the 2nd time in this discussion➡➡full arcane casters are not the only ones stepping on people's toes.

Well, duh, Wraithstrike.

It also makes NPC's weaker. Now, we have equity. In some situations spellcasters will be uninhibited and more effective then mundanes. In other situations, Casters will be suppressed and skills and fighty guys will shine. Tellingly, urban campaigns will favor skill, and rural adventures favor casters.

It makes monsters somewhat more dangerous in cities, because they are 'naturally buffed'. But then martial skill becomes even more important as long as the monsters can't cast, either.

Or the group could come to a better answer that makes more sense thematically. Casters are likely the ones creating these things, and I really doubt they are going to limit themselves like that without some way to bypass it.

In addition, other than GM Fiat there is no reason they(anti magic thingy) can't be destroyed. So the party would...

There are ways to kill a spell engine. Hitting it with a magic item or disintegrate works.

But most are concealed underground and in sealed chambers once set up (the effects radiate through stone). So, yeah, taking down the spell engine now becomes a goal so your casters can work. Just like taking down a spellcaster or flying base becomes a goal so your martials can go to work. Knocking out the spell engine becomes a goal as important as taking down a fortress, and THEN you have to worry about it simply being put back up from a scroll on hand!

And yes, NPC's WILL go after you. hence the need for bodyguards, defensive items, and strong allies. Just like casters will go after martials who can't defend themselves effectively, either! (Like the above guys who lost their buddy to a DC 32 stone to Flesh!)

Or, if you add a variant that allows you to make rings that can work in specific spell engines, and such are destroyed and must be re-equipped from a secure site every day, casters loyal to the master of the spell engine are uninhibited! Now casters get to feel what it's like to be on the end of spells when they can't reply in kind, too!

If you are kind, you could allow magic items to work, like wands and staves, so casters aren't totally helpless. I wouldn't, however, since that just means anyone could craft an item for a specific spell needed to do a job.

Casters would start having some real respect for martials. And it's not hard to do, and is just common sense.

As for casters 'not wanting to do this', temples, guilds and government forces loyal to the city would have little problems with this at all, especially if you use the 'rings' variant so they and they alone can still cast.

Equity can be a real pain. Casters provide themselves on being able to deal with anything. It's a pain when the same attitude can be turned around and fixed on THEM.


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Anzyr wrote:

Inflammatory? No. Challenging? Yes.

I do take it as inflammatory and baiting because of the wording you're using Anzyr.

Although, I clearly stated lots of things about how I GM and how my group enjoys this game, you want to ignore that and use language like:

Anzyr wrote:
This deprives the players of agency within your game. If you players have agreed to be deprived of agency then that's fine, but if not you are doing your players a grave disservice.

You're even implying things about my players, which in my case are my spouse and children.

Read your statement - However you might have intended it, your paragraph only allows 2 options for my group. Either they've just agreed to be deprived of agency "and that's fine", or I'm just not allowing them any. Which answer would you pick if someone applied this to you and your gaming group? You've loaded the question.

Although I laid out the context, you're also taking the text out of it and applying it differently to set this up.

I stated it was for sparing use to create new challenges to remove -some options-, and use in moderation. Go back and re-read it, its ideas for how to create challenges for players to enjoy. You're implying its removing -all choice-, thus "the disservice of removing their agency".
Its never all or none for me or my group.


GM 1990 wrote:
Anzyr wrote:

Inflammatory? No. Challenging? Yes.

I do take it as inflammatory and baiting because of the wording you're using Anzyr.

Although, I clearly stated lots of things about how I GM and how my group enjoys this game, you want to ignore that and use language like:

Anzyr wrote:
This deprives the players of agency within your game. If you players have agreed to be deprived of agency then that's fine, but if not you are doing your players a grave disservice.

You're even implying things about my players, which in my case are my spouse and children.

Read your statement - However you might have intended it, your paragraph only allows 2 options for my group. Either they've just agreed to be deprived of agency "and that's fine", or I'm just not allowing them any. Which answer would you pick if someone applied this to you and your gaming group? You've loaded the question.

Although I laid out the context, you're also taking the text out of it and applying it differently to set this up.

I stated it was for sparing use to create new challenges to remove -some options-, and use in moderation. Go back and re-read it, its ideas for how to create challenges for players to enjoy. You're implying its removing -all choice-, thus "the disservice of removing their agency".
Its never all or none for me or my group.

I would say you are reading things that are not there then as nothing in the post is inflammatory.

If you use fiat, you are depriving your players of their agency. I did not say "all of their agency". Merely the agency you are using fiat to deprive them of. And that does deprive of players of their agency in that circumstance. That's a fact. Full stop.

And those are the only two options in that circumstance, there is no false equivalency here. Either you have done the players a disservice by depriving them of their agency when you use fiat, or they have agreed that it's OK and is therefore fine. There is a third option, where one does not fiat at all, but by your admission that does not apply to you. And I clarified that if your players agree to fiat, that is fine.

Lastly, as I do nothing by GM fiat, your question does not apply to me.


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Anzyr wrote:
GM 1990 wrote:
Anzyr wrote:

Inflammatory? No. Challenging? Yes.

I do take it as inflammatory and baiting because of the wording you're using Anzyr.

Although, I clearly stated lots of things about how I GM and how my group enjoys this game, you want to ignore that and use language like:

Anzyr wrote:
This deprives the players of agency within your game. If you players have agreed to be deprived of agency then that's fine, but if not you are doing your players a grave disservice.

You're even implying things about my players, which in my case are my spouse and children.

Read your statement - However you might have intended it, your paragraph only allows 2 options for my group. Either they've just agreed to be deprived of agency "and that's fine", or I'm just not allowing them any. Which answer would you pick if someone applied this to you and your gaming group? You've loaded the question.

Although I laid out the context, you're also taking the text out of it and applying it differently to set this up.

I stated it was for sparing use to create new challenges to remove -some options-, and use in moderation. Go back and re-read it, its ideas for how to create challenges for players to enjoy. You're implying its removing -all choice-, thus "the disservice of removing their agency".
Its never all or none for me or my group.

I would say you are reading things that are not there then as nothing in the post is inflammatory.

If you use fiat, you are depriving your players of their agency. I did not say "all of their agency". Merely the agency you are using fiat to deprive them of. And that does deprive of players of their agency in that circumstance. That's a fact. Full stop.

And those are the only two options in that circumstance, there is no false equivalency here. Either you have done the players a disservice by depriving them of their agency when you use fiat, or they have agreed that it's OK and is therefore fine. There is a third...

Ok.


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Anzyr wrote:


That right there in bold is the problem though. There are *NO* non-GM fiat counters to spellcasting. You literally just posted antimagic as (presumably) an effective method of dealing with casters in a thread where I explained in great and copious detail how useless antimagic field is against casters. Furthermore you seem to believe that high SR creatures are somehow a counter to casters, despite me pointing out that SR is joke. So what are your non-fiat counters to casters? Because the two you listed there are completely worthless as counters and I am genuinely curious to hear what you think counters spellcasting.

So back to this. I don't look for ways to counter or shut-down a player - not fun for me or them. That list I gave was an example of things that actually all have some kind of in game affects. you've called a couple of them "jokes" - how so? Sure you can come up with situations where they do nothing, but you're asking the rest of us to just ignore the things they do affect if we're to agree with you.

When a monster has SR, and a spell doesn't work on it, how does that make it a joke? What does that really mean in your game, because you seem to think high SR never works on any caster, despite the fact that it can affect spells to varying degrees at different levels.

Its a roll, its not 100% either way, its a tool that affects the encounter in a way the party may not experience often. Not shut down the caster, but add something to the encounter that's been included even in the Bestiary 1.

So, how do you adjudicate SR if its on a monster stat-block?

Do you ignore the spells and affects that -are- affected by anti-magic shell?

They're options for a GM to make encounters different and interesting and remove some possible solutions. Not intended to punish, "remove agency with out consent", etc, and if you look at crit/precise you would have noticed I wasn't talking specific to players of casters either. None of them require GM fiat to be incorporated into encounters, but I'm not look for a 100% thing to stop players from solving the challenges.

Is it only "worthwhile" if it has 100% success to shut down a player option? Because that's what it sounds like you're saying.

You've sat back and pointed to some ideas, placed them in your own constraints and said they were a joke and only work with GM fiat. Do you have any advice, ideas for others about how to make encounters interesting and memorable as magic comes on line?


sr no spells are way more powerful than sr yes spells in general.

My counter to anti magic shell is to walk 10 feet. Or be flying. Its pretty bad as a spell if you think about it


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SR's effectiveness on screwing a caster depends on what spells they're packing. Evocation blaster master? Yeah it's kind of a roadblock. Conjuration pit monkey? Not so much.

Liberty's Edge

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Klara Meison wrote:

>original data OP provided.

So I checked out your original data and it contains some questionable bits. For example:
Fighter(dead/created) 8.408333333/9.081932773
What does it mean for 9.08 fighters to be created? A wizard's familiar got a class level in fighter for 0.08 of fighter? Same with dead fighters-you'd figure it would be an integer number.
There seem to be 2 dead alchemists, but no created alchemists, which raises worrying questions as to the circumstances of their deaths.
A major problem I have though are sample sizes. 1 example per class in some cases is definitely not enough, because a random death there would cause a 100% increase in death rates for that class. For this to be meaningful you would need way, way more data points.

Thanks for looking at the data!

They're not integers because some characters multiclassed. I still counted each multiclassed character as 1 death or creation, but only added a fractional amount to each class' total. The RotR fighter death total was =8+(1/8)+(1/12)+(3/15) because there were multiple multiclassed fighters - for example, "Male Dwarf Cleric of Angradd 12 / Fighter (Weapon Master) 3" only applied 3/15 of a death to the total of fighter deaths. Similar for the characters listed as being created, though multiclassing was rarer as most people only posted 1st-level parties.

You may be misunderstanding the data sources. This is not a paired test, which would require data collected from e.g. PBP threads. I took one set of data from an obituary thread, and then one completely independent set of data from a thread where people reported which characters created. The methods I used for comparing these data did not rely on any assumption of dependence - the only object was to see if the two proportions were significantly different from each other.

I will note that I didn't come up with a single significant Z score for any of those by-class analyses, potentially because number of successes were so low. Yours is a valid concern, though, and is the reason I posted a better analysis by class groupings (minimum "successes," e.g. number of deaths of a specific group, being >10) later in the thread.


Actually I wish to follow up my post from before with an anedode. In one campaign we had to houserule that you can use your casting stat in SR rolls, but this is because the GM's main monster, rakshasa, have massive SR for their level and it would make the bosses she has in store for us basically untouchable without any non-SR spells.


SO martials are always useless so long as you disallow any of the options which can shut down a caster, because, while shutting down a martial is fair shutting down a caster is unfair. Do I have it?


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Not really. Most casters can get past SR without too much trouble, especially if they aren't spontaneous casters. The wizard creates a pit and walks away laughing.

That said, this idea: "Things aren't fun for martials because they have nothing to do? Let's make it so casters have no fun and have nothing to do! This is how we Fix The Game!"

That idea there. It's the equivalent of "What? Women think it's unfair that they can't vote? Well, let's just make it so nobody can vote! There! Fair! What? The Boston Red Sox think it's unfair that they have to play baseball with cinderblocks tied to their ankles? Well, let's just tie cinderblocks to the Yankees' ankles, too! There! All better!"

It needs to die.

Ruining the game for everyone does not make the game work. It makes the problem worse. Instead of creating scenes that shut casters down to balance out the scenes that shut martials down, how about we just stop making encounters that completely shut PCs down?


RDM42 wrote:

SO martials are always useless so long as you disallow any of the options which can shut down a caster, because, while shutting down a martial is fair shutting down a caster is unfair. Do I have it?

Probably not, but if you had a specific example which doesn't involve a GM having to go out of his way to target a caster feel free to post it here.

Also most of use don't think martials are useless. Taking arguments well out of context does not help your position, which at this point is not well understood. If someone did say they were useless then quote and address that person

Otherwise it just looks like passive-aggressive posting.


How is NPC's using spells that are in the world designed for a purpose for the purpose they are designed for going 'out of the way to target a caster'? A strong wizard WOULDN'T think of using Teleport trap to protect his lair? Really? Why not? They aren't allowed to plan?

If the shortcut magic option to do something is short circuited, as long as there are still OTHER ways to do something than someone else gets to act. If every single thing ever that the caster could do was shut down, sure, it would indeed be ridiculous. But the fact that scenarios are inserted where the caster isn't the automatic answer to every issue is not a 'problem' or some sort of unfair targeting.


Kobold Cleaver wrote:

Not really. Most casters can get past SR without too much trouble, especially if they aren't spontaneous casters. The wizard creates a pit and walks away laughing.

That said, this idea: "Things aren't fun for martials because they have nothing to do? Let's make it so casters have no fun and have nothing to do! This is how we Fix The Game!"

That idea there. It's the equivalent of "What? Women think it's unfair that they can't vote? Well, let's just make it so nobody can vote! There! Fair! What? The Boston Red Sox think it's unfair that they have to play baseball with cinderblocks tied to their ankles? Well, let's just tie cinderblocks to the Yankees' ankles, too! There! All better!"

It needs to die.

Ruining the game for everyone does not make the game work. It makes the problem worse. Instead of creating scenes that shut casters down to balance out the scenes that shut martials down, how about we just stop making encounters that completely shut PCs down?

Meaning a total revision of the spellcasting system. mmm. Which would neuter spellcasters, and you're back to square 1.


Kobold Cleaver wrote:

Not really. Most casters can get past SR without too much trouble, especially if they aren't spontaneous casters. The wizard creates a pit and walks away laughing.

That said, this idea: "Things aren't fun for martials because they have nothing to do? Let's make it so casters have no fun and have nothing to do! This is how we Fix The Game!"

That idea there. It's the equivalent of "What? Women think it's unfair that they can't vote? Well, let's just make it so nobody can vote! There! Fair! What? The Boston Red Sox think it's unfair that they have to play baseball with cinderblocks tied to their ankles? Well, let's just tie cinderblocks to the Yankees' ankles, too! There! All better!"

It needs to die.

Ruining the game for everyone does not make the game work. It makes the problem worse. Instead of creating scenes that shut casters down to balance out the scenes that shut martials down, how about we just stop making encounters that completely shut PCs down?

In some scenarios if you shut down the magic shortcut to solving the issue then you have to _find a different way to solve it_. Maybe even using _other people's skills or abilities_.


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RDM42 wrote:

SO martials are always useless so long as you disallow any of the options which can shut down a caster, because, while shutting down a martial is fair shutting down a caster is unfair. Do I have it?

I am not sure if you could miss by more tbh.


Okay, now I'm having a beef with this proposed scenario. Who the hell teleports onto solid ground? You teleport into the air and open the bag of holding with your small army inside of it. I mean you can land before opening the bags but the teleporting thing should be a midair thing at least 150 feet above the place you're invading to avoid getting spotted by things with true seeing.


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RDM42 wrote:

SO martials are always useless so long as you disallow any of the options which can shut down a caster, because, while shutting down a martial is fair shutting down a caster is unfair. Do I have it?

Eh.... Hm... I don't see how martials get any more useful because casters are less... But here's the thing, there are common situations that shuts down a martial. Casters are deemed to be superior because they don't get shut down by these common situations. A lot of situations that shuts down casters affects the entire party as well, not only the caster. And some situations that only shuts down casters can be seen as targeting casters because they're so unlikely.


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Das Bier wrote:
Kobold Cleaver wrote:

Not really. Most casters can get past SR without too much trouble, especially if they aren't spontaneous casters. The wizard creates a pit and walks away laughing.

That said, this idea: "Things aren't fun for martials because they have nothing to do? Let's make it so casters have no fun and have nothing to do! This is how we Fix The Game!"

That idea there. It's the equivalent of "What? Women think it's unfair that they can't vote? Well, let's just make it so nobody can vote! There! Fair! What? The Boston Red Sox think it's unfair that they have to play baseball with cinderblocks tied to their ankles? Well, let's just tie cinderblocks to the Yankees' ankles, too! There! All better!"

It needs to die.

Ruining the game for everyone does not make the game work. It makes the problem worse. Instead of creating scenes that shut casters down to balance out the scenes that shut martials down, how about we just stop making encounters that completely shut PCs down?

Meaning a total revision of the spellcasting system. mmm. Which would neuter spellcasters, and you're back to square 1.

Or maybe we could stop looking at systems problems and saying "Who needs to suffer to fix this?"

Instead of taking away casters' tools, give martials more. It's not that complicated, really.


Actually you need to nerf about half the spells in the game. Some spells are so good you can basically never cast them ever.

Lots of them are auto checkmates which is pretty dumb.


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RDM42 wrote:
Kobold Cleaver wrote:

Not really. Most casters can get past SR without too much trouble, especially if they aren't spontaneous casters. The wizard creates a pit and walks away laughing.

That said, this idea: "Things aren't fun for martials because they have nothing to do? Let's make it so casters have no fun and have nothing to do! This is how we Fix The Game!"

That idea there. It's the equivalent of "What? Women think it's unfair that they can't vote? Well, let's just make it so nobody can vote! There! Fair! What? The Boston Red Sox think it's unfair that they have to play baseball with cinderblocks tied to their ankles? Well, let's just tie cinderblocks to the Yankees' ankles, too! There! All better!"

It needs to die.

Ruining the game for everyone does not make the game work. It makes the problem worse. Instead of creating scenes that shut casters down to balance out the scenes that shut martials down, how about we just stop making encounters that completely shut PCs down?

In some scenarios if you shut down the magic shortcut to solving the issue then you have to _find a different way to solve it_. Maybe even using _other people's skills or abilities_.

Which is great, and all, but one-person scenes aren't actually very fun. This is the problem with traps and haunts, too, incidentally—and why casters try to subvert traps with their spells instead of letting the rogue handle it. It's not super fun to play an encounter that only one player gets to contribute to, whether it's the caster or the martial making the contribution. It's also not super fun to have to sit out an encounter while your partymembers do all the work.

Instead of creating these "Sit still and watch your partymember be cool" encounters (which are already prevalent enough thanks to save-or-suck effects, so we don't need more of them), let's just try to play a game in which everyone gets to use their own skill or abilities. Nobody wants to play the bystander. Don't force them to.


CWheezy wrote:

Actually you need to nerf about half the spells in the game. Some spells are so good you can basically never cast them ever.

Lots of them are auto checkmates which is pretty dumb.

Care to provide an example? Short of mythic time stop, or perhaps unregulated Wish or Miracle I can't really think of any.


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Blood money needs a 24 hour delay or possibly more on when it can be healed. People talk about crafting wrecking WBL, well this smashes it into pieces and only in the caster's favor this time, giving them free permanant arcane sight, see invisibility, symbol of whatever, the list goes on and on and you just need someone packing restoration to make you all better.


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Well, little exploits like the Geas abuse and Blood Money crap is a whole other story. A GM can handle those. It's bigger than simulacrum nonsense.

Paizo Employee Design Manager

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HyperMissingno wrote:
Blood money needs a 24 hour delay or possibly more on when it can be healed. People talk about crafting wrecking WBL, well this smashes it into pieces and only in the caster's favor this time, giving them free permanant arcane sight, see invisibility, symbol of whatever, the list goes on and on and you just need someone packing restoration to make you all better.

Blood money is never going to be errata'd because it's not even from a source book, it's from an AP.

Yes, it's a super powerful spell, but it's from like a tertiary source. I just ban it, and I ban very, very little.

Kobold Cleaver wrote:
Well, little exploits like the Geas abuse and Blood Money crap is a whole other story. A GM can handle those. It's bigger than simulacrum nonsense.

Geas and simulacrum are core spells, and a lot of the things I see get described as "abuse" are just players thinking they're using the spells as intended. I think there are even Forgotten Realms books where the casters are actually portrayed as "abusing" those particular spells.

Blood Money is an AP spell created for a particular character, and abusing it usually requires things like body swapping and using spells from other power sources. Geas and simulacrum can be broken just using them exactly as written and presented in the CRB. When you're using something exactly as it's presented in the CRB, I don't think it's fair to call it abuse.


Blood money

Simulacrum

Fabricate with blood money

Arodens spellbane

Mages disjunction

Miracle

Wish.

Marionette posession.

There are some others. Create demiplane is close.


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wraithstrike wrote:
RDM42 wrote:

SO martials are always useless so long as you disallow any of the options which can shut down a caster, because, while shutting down a martial is fair shutting down a caster is unfair. Do I have it?

Probably not, but if you had a specific example which doesn't involve a GM having to go out of his way to target a caster feel free to post it here.

Also most of use don't think martials are useless. Taking arguments well out of context does not help your position, which at this point is not well understood. If someone did say they were useless then quote and address that person

Otherwise it just looks like passive-aggressive posting.

I can't speak for RDM, or some of the other GMs that posted, but it does often feel like if you say, you made an encounter (not an adventure, and not a campaign...an encounter, 1 part of 1 session) that included something like a no-teleport, or anti-magic, or SR monster you're immediately targeted by a couple zealots, with implications that its bad GMwrongfun, stealing agency, hating casters, shutting down players, etc. Not even removing ever possible spell option....either, just using things that exist in the game to provide -your own- players an enjoyable session.

While you'll hear nothing but crickets if you say you created an encounter that was DR/xxx and your group's melee characters had to use their back-up weapon to be "most effective".

its a double standard for some people on the forums, that's what gets old, as well as the "always/never" or other extremes that get tossed on your post regardless of if you clearly stated "sometimes, or infrequent". And I've created a house fighter to give them more toys....I know magic changes the options to characters, and I'm ok with that. So its interesting who will attack you for explaining how you operate your game, and why you do it that way and how you work -within the CMD- to create fun encounters for your players that include variety over time.


Ssalarn wrote:
Kobold Cleaver wrote:
Well, little exploits like the Geas abuse and Blood Money crap is a whole other story. A GM can handle those. It's bigger than simulacrum nonsense.
Geas and simulacrum are core spells, and a lot of the things I see get described as "abuse" are just players thinking they're using the spells as intended.

I didn't say they weren't Core. My point is that these spells don't matter. They are minor glitches a GM can easily amend—you can call misuse of them "abuse", or you can not, if the word offends you, but the fact remains that they're fringe cases. These spells are not the problem. They are often lazily cited as evidence of the problem, but getting rid of them would not make the problem go away.


I forgot about limited wish, its also too good.


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Ssalarn wrote:
HyperMissingno wrote:
Blood money needs a 24 hour delay or possibly more on when it can be healed. People talk about crafting wrecking WBL, well this smashes it into pieces and only in the caster's favor this time, giving them free permanant arcane sight, see invisibility, symbol of whatever, the list goes on and on and you just need someone packing restoration to make you all better.

Blood money is never going to be errata'd because it's not even from a source book, it's from an AP.

Yes, it's a super powerful spell, but it's from like a tertiary source. I just ban it, and I ban very, very little.

Kobold Cleaver wrote:
Well, little exploits like the Geas abuse and Blood Money crap is a whole other story. A GM can handle those. It's bigger than simulacrum nonsense.

Geas and simulacrum are core spells, and a lot of the things I see get described as "abuse" are just players thinking they're using the spells as intended. I think there are even Forgotten Realms books where the casters are actually portrayed as "abusing" those particular spells.

Blood Money is an AP spell created for a particular character, and abusing it usually requires things like body swapping and using spells from other power sources. Geas and simulacrum can be broken just using them exactly as written and presented in the CRB. When you're using something exactly as it's presented in the CRB, I don't think it's fair to call it abuse.

I agree and really when we explored those spells in a set of threads about game altering/game breaking spells (and we covered wish, simulacrum, etc) I can only remember 1 example from a real game that most of us thought would have had to have been banned. The theory crafters didn't seem to actually have gotten anywhere in normal gaming groups.

A lot of it can be handled just talking with the players and ensuring you agree on what the intention was, and what's reasonable and prudent for your group.


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RDM42 wrote:

SO martials are always useless so long as you disallow any of the options which can shut down a caster, because, while shutting down a martial is fair shutting down a caster is unfair. Do I have it?

Using GM Fiat is a good way to shut down casters. AMF spell isn't. Neither is SR. Walking a short distance and throwing snowballs solves the former, and summoning (or even snowballs) solves the latter. And these are combat issues, when a lot of the real problems are noncombat ones (levitate>climb, teleport>walking, knock>disable device, etc).
Quote:
In some scenarios if you shut down the magic shortcut to solving the issue then you have to _find a different way to solve it_. Maybe even using _other people's skills or abilities_.

This is the other half of the problem...what other abilities? SU abilties (like the ones full casters ooze)? Mundane Skills (like the ones wizards get tons of because of a use for +10 INT)? I am all for having the entire party participate, but usually this happens when someone other than the wizard casts the spell that fixes the problem. Its another reason I like inquisitor, it is very much a martial who can also pop invisibility, knock, tongues, etc.


What, they are a huge part of the problem, lol.


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Not really. A few broken options do not a disparity make. Fixing those spells might make things a bit tidier, but the disparity would continue unabated.

You can get rid of every single spell that gives casters an edge over martials, if you want—no more major debuffs, no more Will saves, no more illusions or teleports or flying or summons or shapeshifting or charms or terrain control—but in the process you eliminate a lot of flavor and just kind of make everyone suck. Better idea: Instead of taking away casters' crazy tools, give the martials crazy tools to match.

Then we can start worrying about little things like patching up Blood Money and rewriting Wish. But until we've fixed martials, nerfing casters isn't going to make any real improvement in game enjoyment.


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They are very visible, not prolific. They are symptoms more than anything.


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Kobold Cleaver wrote:

Not really. Most casters can get past SR without too much trouble, especially if they aren't spontaneous casters. The wizard creates a pit and walks away laughing.

That said, this idea: "Things aren't fun for martials because they have nothing to do? Let's make it so casters have no fun and have nothing to do! This is how we Fix The Game!"

That idea there. It's the equivalent of "What? Women think it's unfair that they can't vote? Well, let's just make it so nobody can vote! There! Fair! What? The Boston Red Sox think it's unfair that they have to play baseball with cinderblocks tied to their ankles? Well, let's just tie cinderblocks to the Yankees' ankles, too! There! All better!"

It needs to die.

Ruining the game for everyone does not make the game work. It makes the problem worse. Instead of creating scenes that shut casters down to balance out the scenes that shut martials down, how about we just stop making encounters that completely shut PCs down?

This. This here is how it should be done IMO.

If one player outshines all the rest it can be handled OOC, because odds are they don't realise it. Using a spell in its intended way can in many cases outperform or negat a martial's fun. Mentioning that you are making the game less fun in many cases lifts restictions the PCs cause.

As the GM, you choose what monsters you use and what they do. If one monster makes paladins fall from grace with a spell, don't use that spell on the paladin. If a monster causes AOE fatigue then the fight won't be fun for a bloodrager. Consider what fights will be both challenging and fun for everybody before writing or using a scenario. Its why I drop Traps in favor of guards and ambushes, because then 5 people have fun, not 2.


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Agreed. I don't even think they're symptoms, really—the ideas that led to the C/MD (a mix of "martials can go all day" and a lack of awareness of the "option disparity") didn't have a ton to do with a few poorly-built spells. But it's definitely not the root. It's also less likely to come up—most casters don't think to try to exploit Blood Money or Simulacrum.

Y'know how people think that the C/MD is only a problem because of theorycrafters on here? That's not true, but it's sort of true about some of these spells. Most people don't even know about Blood Money, let alone use it. The Sno-Cone Wish Machine isn't likely to surface in most games, either. And Geas/Quest makes most players think of its intended usage: A flavorful tool for redemption, not an auto-penalty to rolls.

That's not to say there aren't still big problems with these spells, for the record. But some of them get a bit overblown. It's sort of like how some people condemn the alchemist because of very specific builds, ignoring how most alchemists do just fine. :P


Paradozen wrote:
RDM42 wrote:

SO martials are always useless so long as you disallow any of the options which can shut down a caster, because, while shutting down a martial is fair shutting down a caster is unfair. Do I have it?

Using GM Fiat is a good way to shut down casters. AMF spell isn't. Neither is SR. Walking a short distance and throwing snowballs solves the former, and summoning (or even snowballs) solves the latter. And these are combat issues, when a lot of the real problems are noncombat ones (levitate>climb, teleport>walking, knock>disable device, etc).
Quote:
In some scenarios if you shut down the magic shortcut to solving the issue then you have to _find a different way to solve it_. Maybe even using _other people's skills or abilities_.
This is the other half of the problem...what other abilities? SU abilties (like the ones full casters ooze)? Mundane Skills (like the ones wizards get tons of because of a use for +10 INT)? I am all for having the entire party participate, but usually this happens when someone other than the wizard casts the spell that fixes the problem. Its another reason I like inquisitor, it is very much a martial who can also pop invisibility, knock, tongues, etc.

How is that GM Fiat though, having a wizard use a spell available to wizards to negate another wizards?

By that logic ANY situation that ever prevents the use of any player ability of any kind is GM fiat. Its GM fiat if the DC is to high for a successful climb check> Its DM fiat if a creature which a certain damage resistance is used, etcetera.

Why is it fiat if it invalidates for a scenario a specific or a few specific spells?> Its not as if, with most wizards, they will suddenly be useless for the whole scenario if they aren't able to just invalidate the scenario with a teleport spell. It isn't as if they will suddenly have nothing to do for the whole session unless they are allowed to just short circuit the whole session. And believe me, from personal experience, when the magic "I win; button gets shut down in a specific situation, creative players, which most are, don't just sit on their thumbs. They find a way to use the other abilities and skills they have to make things happen.


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Yeah, in the end pretty much everything is GM Fiat. XD And rather than trying to just say stuff doesn't work, I think it's better to approach in from several directions.

1) First, out of character, talk to the players. Remind them that it takes a lot of effort to properly prepare and run a game, and if they go too far outside of what you expect by using magic to quickly dart past it, you might not have anything prepared for them to play. Basically, ask them to just be good players and go along with what you (as the GM) have set up, and let you know if they feel too constrained.

2) Allow at least some encounters to be throwaways that the PCs can bypass. Honestly, as long as they burn a few resources in the process, it's usually good for the GM. The last thing you want is to let a party face a boss with full resources. XD

3) Try to be reactive. For example, maybe a strategy they come up with works once, but word spreads and future enemies start putting countermeasures in place, encouraging the PCs to be careful about using magic on NPCs.

4) Try to say "Yes". Before denying a PC's plan, see if you can actually let it work. People are playing for fun, and ESPECIALLY if they've put some real thought and planning into it, it's usually best to encourage them. Otherwise, if they feel that creativity is worthless, they'll just beat stuff up and minimize their interest in roleplaying... and if you want roleplaying, that'd be bad. XD

...and so on.


GM Rednal wrote:
3) Try to be reactive. For example, maybe a strategy they come up with works once, but word spreads and future enemies start putting countermeasures in place, encouraging the PCs to be careful about using magic on NPCs

That one might not work so well if the PCs capture or kill everyone involved in the fight.


Perhaps the big bad is scry int and watching the fight his minions are having with this thorn in his side to see what is causing so much trouble?


RDM42 wrote:

Perhaps the big bad is scry int and watching the fight his minions are having with this thorn in his side to see what is causing so much trouble?

10 feet radius of vision ain't enough to get the full info on what went down, and that's assuming there's not more pressing, time sensitive matters at hand than watching minions. On top of that you'd have to be lucky to scry on them as the fight went down assuming the PCs are proactive and hunt down minion strongholds.


It depends on the situation, of course. XD I mean, if it's way deep in a dungeon, then yeah, it's doubtful anyone will notice... although a smart villain might send minions to get the PCs to brag about how they did stuff, and plan accordingly. XD On the other hand, if they do a public break-in right in the middle of a city, well... how they did it is probably going to be figured out pretty fast.


Point is, in practical terms it is likely impossible to never leave evidence of your tactics.

Paizo Employee Design Manager

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Kobold Cleaver wrote:
***the ideas that led to the C/MD (a mix of "martials can go all day" and a lack of awareness of the "option disparity"***

Two of my favorite misconceptions. There's no such thing as an "all day" class, because every class has at least one limited resource-hit points. You can even go a step farther and say that every class has eight limited resources, because ability scores and even levels are things that can be targeted and decreased. Enough negative levels, you're dead. Con drops to zero, you're dead. Any other stat drops to zero, you're comatose. Which leads into one aspect of option disparity- a Fighter or Rogue gets wounded, or takes strength damage, their option is "sleep it off" or "burn a consumable (which a magical character made for me)". A spellcaster gets wounded or takes ability damage, their options may include "heal it directly with a spell", "inflate the damaged stat artificially with a spell", "replace the damaged stat with a spell", "summon something that can fix the damage for you", and they always still have "sleep it off" and "burn a consumable" just like the non-magical characters.

Those issues are also tied to my least favorite forum suggestion of "don't allow fifteen minute adventuring days!".... Yeah, I don't. Anecdotally, I've found that the more non-magical martials are in the group, the more likely you are to have players trying to pull a 15 minute adventuring day. For example-

I have two 4th level parties (and these are both real actual parties from real actual games)-

Party A features a human Paladin frontliner, an archetyped half-elf Alchemist who gains some extra Rogue-ish abilities for dealing with traps and such (can't recall the name, but it's from the same book as the Terracotta Monk), a half-orc Sorcerer (Orc Bloodline), and a half-orc Anger Inquisition Inquisitor.

Party B features a half-orc Fighter (Dirty Fighter), a halfling Rogue (Swashbuckler), an elf Ranger (Skirmisher), and a dwarf Life Oracle.

Both of these groups participated in Emerald Spire sessions, and dealt with most of the same encounters, but group A managed to clear "The Drowned Level" (something like 4 summoners with eidolons, a myriad of water elementals, a swarm, some traps and environmental hazards, 8 encounters in all if I recall correctly) in much less than 1 full day's time, and pushed through the next level's "Clockwork Maze" before they were forced to rest because they'd completely exhausted their resources. Party B had to take two 8 hour rests to clear the level and never finished the Clockwork Maze.

Why this happened-

Both groups were pretty equivalently skilled, and despite basically all of group B's magic residing in one character, they had arguably the best single-classed healer the game offers on their team, so healing resources were pretty equivalent. The issue was that the individual characters in Class A were much better able to balance their resources and stretch them through multiple encounters. The Paladin covered a lot of his own healing via Lay on Hands, and made several key saves the Fighter didn't (the summoners would open fights by hitting the parties with glitterdust, which blinded the Fighter in 2 out of the 3 encounters that featured the summoners). The Sorcerer and Alchemist both had access to false life and managed to only lose actual hit points in the boss fight, and that mainly because the Sorcerer took a x3 crit from a ranseur dealing 2d4+7 damage, and the Alchemist only had 1 false life extract prepared (though he had other means of healing). Party B's fights also lasted an average of 3 rounds longer, in no small part due to the failed saves of the Fighter and Rogue, who struggled to be relevant in combat, doubly so since the Rogue's main source of damage, Sneak Attack, was ineffective against the elementals.

As a note on whether or not these encounters might be considered to favor one party over the other, I think it's important to note that every. single. enemy. in the Drowned Level of Emerald Spire is some form of Neutral. The Paladin didn't get to use Smite Evil once during the entire level, while the Rogue's Sneak Attack still functioned against more than half the threats.

Now, I'm probably as guilty of hyperbole as others on the board when it comes to saying things like "martials are a drain on party resources that give nothing in return", but I firmly believe it is 100% true that non-magical characters bring fewer resources than magical characters, and often consume more resources along the way due to lacking certain options. So in my experience, parties trying to pull 15 minute adventuring days is usually a martial issue, not a magical one. The more magic the party has at its disposal, the longer their adventuring day lasts. This is obviously exasperated somewhat when one of the martials in question is the Fighter (who did take Iron Will and made sure to have at least a 12 Wisdom by the way; that plus a cloak of resistance +1 still only got him to +5, or a 50% chance of making the save vs. glitterdust's blinding effect. The Paladin had a +10- +4 Cha, +4 base save, +1 trait, +1 cloak of resistance).

So, when I hear someone say "Don't allow 15 minute adventuring days, that fixes C/MD!" I assume what they're saying is "Let the martial characters die until they learn better and play a caster". After all, if you have a tank who can provide his own flight, that's one more spell slot or scroll back in the Wizard's arsenal. If you have a tank covering his own healing, each time he does it that's money back in the pocket and/or spells back in the healer's arsenal. Each time someone's supernaturally augmented saves or hit points negate damage or a status effect, those are resources back in the party's pool. So on and so forth.


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RDM42 wrote:
Point is, in practical terms it is likely impossible to never leave evidence of your tactics if you lack a full caster and don't prepare properly.

You forgot a few words.


HyperMissingno wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Point is, in practical terms it is likely impossible to never leave evidence of your tactics if you lack a full caster and don't prepare properly.
You forgot a few words.

No, I didn't. Full caster doesn't matter, especially if the other side has them too.

They are not, in fact, gods that completely invalid the other side just because they are PCS. And no amount of proper preparation will make you permenantly perfect in hiding all of your actions and tactics.

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