Dirty 'n Evil's page

Quite frankly, the problem is with your players who want to have thier cake and eat it to. (snip) so the answer is... challenge them to man up and go for it despite surrendering a bit of their thrones.

There's another facet to this problem, perhaps it might shed some light on the issue. I have one player in my group, and he's got a bit of a lean towards the power gamer side. He only plays tank oriented Fighters or Barbarians, or maxed out with every advantage Wizards. Not much variety or difference between his characters... and they always invariably become that main consideration in each and every fight, because he builds them with greater thought towards game mechanics than personality.

This creates situations where the classes with "gimmick" spellcasting always feeling like they're playing second fiddle when he plays one of his tanks... they're not his peer, and feel like their less effective spells don't contribute sufficiently against his Conan-like methods. Contrastingly, when he plays one of his Wizards they're clearly more reliant on the protection on the warrior types to protect his hide, but it always seems like it's always that Wizard's spell that tips the scale of battle - not the action of any other characters.

So, I have players who dislike the variety of the classes with lesser spell casting because they don't want to trade diversity for lessened effect. They see how the game master du jour has two choices... they can make a combat that's challenging towards this one player's characters and almost frustratingly difficult towards everyone elses', or they make it challenging towards the group as a whole and watch this one player's character pick apart the encounter like Wayne Gretzky vs. the NJ Devils of old.

I've tried encouraging this player to try something else... a Rogue, for goodness sakes! But they're not interested. So, I've been thinking of a way to reward the players who do take a more varied path with their characters rather than punish the one player and making him feel picked on. And it seems like spellcasting is a key issue of contention.

Whoops - I was remembering off the top of my head, and I confused "Practiced Spellcaster" with a different feat, misremembered the effects. My bad. *sheepish grin*

Still looking for other suggestions, so anyone... fire away!

Thanks for your input... but I still see the problems. "Practiced Spellcaster" Feat could be taken by a spellcaster who doesn't deviate from the exclusively sorcerer/wizard raising, and as such the divide still exists. And the non-spellcasting variants are almost exclusively what my group prefers to play. I personally like the option of having a bit of magic in a character that isn't the main spellcaster... but why should one limit oneself for an ability that doesn't really positively impact gameplay?

I'm trying to think of a way to give more "punch" to the magic that is available to the players, whether they're a Ranger, or the Wizard who has a theological bend and dedicates a couple levels to Cleric. We all see how quickly lower spell levels become irrelevant, and when you only allow a class lower spell levels that access becomes irrelevant at the same rate.

I'm going to write up this little nagging problem I've had with spellcasting, and hopefully get some feedback as to solutions / alternate perspectives from the community here. My problem stems from the fact that I've seen my groups' fighters and rogues and all assorted classes willing to try a few levels of this class or a few levels of that class which I like... it makes them less one dimensional characters. However, my spellcasters rarely attempt such forrays into other classes or prestige classes because for every level of spellcasting they miss out on, it's nothing that can be compensated for by taking another class. My players complain it hurts their immediate effectiveness in the group to do anything other than focus exclusively on their spellcasting.

I see a related issue with those classes that have limited spellcasting - Bards, Rangers, to an extent the Paladin. Often, I'm faced with requests of "if I ditch my spellcasting on this class, what can I get in exchange?" The feeling is that the way spells are worked into the system one either focuses on them to exclusion to keep the spells used by the characters relevant for the challenges thrown at them, or else it's considered more of a "gimmick" ability that costs their class more than it benefits. Useful for a cosmetic option of the character, but easily duplicated if not outright made useless by a magic item in many cases.

My question is... how do I make it attractive to characters to break out of this all or nothing mindset with spellcasting? Have other game masters felt this conflict as well, and how did you handle it? I'm naturally looking for the smoothest option out there - drastically restructuring the game isn't my idea of fun.

I've toyed with the idea of perhaps reworking spellcasting charts for those classes that had minor spellcasting so they perhaps were closer to the sorcerer and wizard to when a new spell level was achieved... only curtailing them to casting even fewer spells for balance. However, this doesn't solve the problem for the wizard or sorcerer. Perhaps if there was some way to keep their magic competitive, even when not focusing on it to exclusion... I'm eager to hear input on this issue.

Just a small addition to this conversation. :)

Before encounter "Pathfinder", my RPing group used the floating bonus to ability scores idea as well... however, we limited this bonus to only apply towards the physical statistics of Strength, Dexderity, and Constitution. We reasoned that no Changeling would be able to alter aspects of his psyche, except to play act that they were somehow more deficient than they actually were. Just a thought.