Guide to MageHunting


Advice


Hello all! I've been working on a guide to MageHunting, focusing on killing Spellcasters. It's definitely far from complete, but I want to get your input on it so far. I'll request it be added to the Guide to Guides to Broken Z once I have a more complete form. Wall breaks + pictures will come later.

Thanks

Here is the Guide


I have some ideas I like.

I use heighten, persistent, aqueous orb. If that fails my tiger animal companion grabs them. This is a sylvan sorcerer.

Reach, step up, disruptive is a combo that enjoy with any martial flexibility class feature.

High initiative on a pounce can ruin a casters day. Coordinated charge combat feat can end the fight fast.


So problem one: "Spellcaster" means a lot of things. 0 HD humanoid with levels in a spellcasting class is one of them. Outsider with more SLAs than wizards have spells are another. Outsiders who are also full spellcasters are another. Classed monsters are yet another. You only appear to address one of those.

Problem two: "Party spellcasters can help you actually hit them" means you're talking spellcaster v spellcaster, not martial v spellcaster.

Problem three: Spell resistance might be useful, but it's equally likely to shut down ally casters trying to help you (it's a standard action to lower). And if your allies can penetrate it easily, so can your enemies. You need 11+level to make it 50/50 for an equal level caster with no bonus to it whatsoever. And again, allied casters will have that same chance of succeeding on buffs, heals, etc.

Problem four: Healing in combat is bad, until they get Heal. Then they're healing themselves for 110 minimum, outpacing most character's DPR, especially at the level it appears.

Minor omission one: Reflex is actually most caster's worst save. Dex is usually tertiary (after casting stat and Con). Fort is a good save for cleric, magus, and druid, so there's no easy way to say "this caster has a bad Fort save".

Minor omission two: You leave out Step Up on keeping up with the spellcasters and don't give any way to actually stick next to them. Before casting defensively, they can just 5-foot step.

Minor omission three: The feat to ready a charge is Rhino Charge but you don't address how to actually pull it off. If you spend your standard action readying an action it should be obvious to everyone involved. For a spellcaster, there's no reason they won't assume you're readying an action to disrupt spellcasting (as that's a good use of it). What's to stop them from moving/flying/burrowing farther away and then casting?

Problem five: You can't talk about how great martial AC is when you've told people to ignore armor and only focus on touch AC. That's contradictory.

Problem six: Battlefield Navigation is about moving around the battlefield, not having things to do on the battlefield. And martials suck at this. As for using the combat chapter, martials are still not the best. Many spells replicate combat maneuvers, just from a long distance, with a larger area, and with more rider effects. Black Tentacles, Aqueous Orb, Toppling Magic Missile, Hydraulic Torrent, the list goes on.

Minor omission four: Are Paladins not martials? They have great saves. All good saves on the Monk is okay but their stats will be lower if they keep Dex, Wis, and Con at the same level.

Problem seven: One race (with problematic fluff), a specific type of build (mounted combat), and a ridiculous skill check (DC 40 to jump 10 feet high) do not a "solution" make. Having a pocket spellcaster again brings this into spellcaster v spellcaster instead of martial v spellcaster.

Problem eight: Again, you can't talk about how great armor is for the martials and then say it's useless half a page later.

Problem nine: Your conclusion appears to be "if all of you jump the spellcaster then you can defeat them". If all of the party needs to help the magekiller then it's a bad magekiller. If all of the party is tied up fighting one enemy, what are the other enemies doing?

Problem ten: Disruptive is (normally) 6th level fighter only. It's also not that great, as you need a way to keep them in your threatened range, need to be aware of their location, and have to have an AoO remaining. If any of those are not true, it doesn't help.

Problem eleven: Scorpion Style is terrible. It's its own standard action and the best possible result is that you reduce their base land speed. Fliers, burrowers, swimmers just keep on trucking on. It's Stunning Fist, except Stunning Fist can be done as part of a full attack and causes a much more powerful status.

Minor omission five: Teleport Tactician requires Spellbreaker which requires a 10th level fighter (normally). It's a nice effect, but it's fairly high level.

Problem twelve: Touch of Serenity requires an 11th level monk or an 8th level other character (with 18 Wis). In return it's a Will save (all caster's good save) and just stops them from casting one round. Presumably they'll just withdraw, now far enough away you can't hit them again, and cast next round. You buy yourself a single round, basically. It might work against solo spellcasters, but that's about it.

Problem thirteen: You don't address how mounted martials deal with their mount being targeted. A cavalier whose horse got Mazed isn't going to be nearly as useful.

Minor omission six: Fighters do not have "sweet Vital Strike focus". Most of the classes on your list have full BAB, the fighter is not special in that regard. And that's not including the several full BAB classes you left out.

Problem fourteen: Monks are okay mage hunters, not great. They have worse overall saves than a barbarian or paladin. They deal the least damage of everyone on your list. Stunning Fist's DC is based on Wis, for every point in Wis there's less for attack, defense, skills, saves, HP, etc. There are ways to mitigate this but stat distribution matters for monks. You can't say unequivocally that they have "good" Stunning Fist DCs. Even if they had great DCs it's a good save for the cleric, druid, and magus. The only thing Monks are good at is land speed.

Problem fifteen: Grapplers work until spellcasters (clerics specifically) get Freedom of Movement and eventually everyone else gets rings of Freedom of Movement. Tetori is literally the only class who can do something about this. It is the grappler for a reason. Liberating Command can wreak similar havoc on a grappler (double CL to Escape Artist, max +20) or Grease (flat +10).

Now the general critique:

You need consistency. You cannot say martials should ignore AC, then that they have great AC, then that they should ignore it again. You also shouldn't open the section on spellcaster strengths with "they have terrible AC". Just focus on their strengths, list their weaknesses in the appropriate section.

You need to give hard details, not vague suggestions. When you say "stay in their face", you need to include actual suggestions to do that.

You mention DPR several times when you actually only care about single-hit damage (for disrupting spellcasting).

You need to be more upfront about what kind of guide you're writing. You're writing a guide for "melee combatant who harasses human wizards", basically. You completely ignore archery (who can ready to disrupt from 1000 feet away). You only mention mounted combat in passing and only because of flying, not the 50 feet a base horse gets or the 80 feet with a 3k magic item. Many of your suggestions rely on a poor Fort save or poor CMD, both of which are primarily true for wizards and not for druids and clerics (especially the Wild Shape and Battle variety, respectively).

You include the inquisitor (a 6 level casting class) but leave out the paladin, ranger, rogue, and gunslinger. Paladin and ranger, at a minimum, are better than cavalier, fighter, and monk. Rogue at least deserves a mention because you suggest a feat that requires 5d6 sneak attack. Gunslinger appears to be omitted for the same reason you completely ignore archery (except for Deadly Aim, for some reason).

Overall, you need a clearer focus and concrete examples. Strategies and tactics probably deserves its own section and you need actual, real information. When you say "keep close to spellcasters" you need actual information on how. When you say "you can ready a charge", that's the time to put the feat name so they don't have to hunt in the feat section for it. You also need to make clear which advice is for which type of caster. A battle cleric or druid will be quite happy for you stick close to them while they beat you to death. A wizard less so.


You bring up some rather good points. I am rather I'll equipped for this due to my current system mastery. Plus, this would basically be combining all the guides out there. I got a little too ambitious. I'll leave this for individual guides to acknowledge.


2 people marked this as a favorite.

Don't give up. It's a fun read don't let critical comments sap your enthusiasm.


So in hindsight, it probably comes across as a lot more critical than I meant it. I was just scrolling through the guide and picking out specific bits I saw. You do have the right general ideas, you just need to continue to develop the suggestions presented.

Now, if it's just the scope (and you're right, it's enormous) then consider narrowing your scope. Focus on something more specific. "How to fight wizards with a sword". "How to fight wizards with a bow". "How to fight wizards while mounted". Something like that, where you don't have to say "spellcaster" and then immediately cover multiple completely different types of characters or "martial" and have the exact same problem.

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