Hi to all.
First of all please mind my english. It has been a while since i learnt it at school and all my actual english (un)knowledge comes from simpson cartoons :)
Ok before i begin i want to say two things.
1)Why balance? I know there are many people out there who say that balance isn`t that important. Dnd is a team game, good roleplayers do not need balance, good gamemasters don`t need balance etc. i heard it all. So if you have another opinion please don`t post it. Its only because almost everytime i read about balancing issues in a mesageboard they ended up in flaming wars.... Imho balance is one of the most important issues within a rules system. Perhaps it`s because i originally come from the strategy gamers faction or perhaps it is because i`ve seen to often what unbalanced rulesystems can do. Its simply no fun playing a dwarven fighter with a battlehammer when the cleric does more damage (cause he took the longsword and rolled a 18strengh) or playing a nimble light armored knive fighter when the knight next to you has a better AC and damage output . I know a „real“ roleplayer would play it anyway but i don`t think that such players should be punished by the system.
2)Why maths? Well believe me: I HATE maths! But as im relatively new to the 3.X edition it`s the only way for me too contribute. (i have never encountered CoDzilla for example). Another reason is that my group wants to finish our actuall 3.5 campaign before we begin the RotRL AP.
I know that statistics cannot take things like combat maneuvers, special abilities etc. into account (to be true they can but then you need a real math student or professor and not me :)
But they are good in comparing sheer damage dealing and damage absorbing capabilities of the classes.
Ok thats beeing said, what have i done? Well basically i made for every warrior class a level 10char and then i let them fight each other. For simplicitys sake i let the fighter fight each other class. If the paladin is equal to the fighter and the ranger is equal to the fighter then the paladin should be equal to the ranger(at least thats what i think).
I let them start in 5feet distance because otherwise the char who wins the initiative has a major drawback because he cannot make use his full attack action. I know this is completely unrealistic for a single combat but i dont wanna know what happens in one combat i want to know what happens in 1000 combats.
Ok here are the characters:
Fighter
St 20 Con 16 Dex 14 Wi10 Int10 Cha10
Feats:
Dodge, Imp. Crit (Greatsword), 2xToughness, WeaponFocus (Greatsword), Imp. WeaponFocus(Greatsword), WeaponSpezialisation (Greatsword), Improved WeaponSpecialisation (Greatsword),Overhand Chop, Backswing, PowerAttack,
Gear: Greatsword +2, Full Plate +1, ring of protection +1
Barbarian
stats like the fighter
Feats:
Imp. Crit (Greatsword), Weapon Focus (Greatsword),Overhand Chop, Backswing, PowerAttack,
Gear: like fighter but instead of a fullplate he has chainmail. I know in this case he has spent 1000gp less but i dont really know what to buy with these...
Ranger
St 18 Con 14 Dex 15 Wi13 Int10 Cha10
Feats: Two weapon fighting, Improved Two weapon fighting, Double Slice(i used the normal st with backhand version though i dont know which one is the real one in the beta), Dodge, Imp. Critical (shortsword), Weapon Focus (shortsword), Toughness, Two Weapon defense,
Gear: Chainshirt+2, ring of protection +1, amulet of natural armor +1, 2x shortsword +1
And here comes the fight.
Fighter vs. Barbarian
Fighter
Fighter Attack Bonus: 21/16
Damage: 24,5/22 with crits: 29,4/26,4
HP: 124,5 (using the method of our group. Full Hp on lvl 1 and min half the HitDice on further lvls)
AC: 25
Barbarian (with rage and using the „unexpected strike“ power)
Attack Bonus: 20/20/15
Damage: 22,5/19/19 with crits 27/22,8/22,8
HP: 131,75 (temporary HP from rage included)
AC: 16
Fighter hits Barbarian:
1.Attack: 95%HitChance x 27 = 25,65 Dmg
2.Attack: 95%HitChance x 24 = 22,8 Dmg
That makes a total Dmg of 48,45 per round.
131,75HP / 48,45 Dmg = 2,72 rounds until the Barbarian has 0HP
Barbarian hits fighter:
1.Attack: 80%HitChance x 27 = 21,6 Dmg
2.Attack: 80%HitChance x 22,8 = 18,24 Dmg
3.Attack: 55%HitChance x 22,8 = 12,54 Dmg
That makes a total Dmg of 52,38 per round.
124,5HP / 52,38 Dmg = 2,38 rounds until the fighter has 0HP
So as we can see the barbarian is slightly stronger than the fighter but only for the 4 rounds he can maintain his rage (with the unexpected strike).
Fighter vs. Ranger
Fighter
Fighter Attack Bonus: 21/16
Damage: 24,5/22 with crits: 29,4/26,4
HP: 124,5 (using the method of our group. Full Hp on lvl 1 and min half the HitDice on further lvls)
AC: 25
Ranger
Attack Bonus: 21/21/16/16 (two weapon penalty and +6 Favored enemy included)
Damage: 15,5/15,15/15,5/15,5 (+6 Favored Enemy)
HP: 101.5
AC: 24 (with cats grace)
Fighter hits Ranger:
3.Attack: 90%HitChance x 29,4 = 26,46 Dmg
4.Attack: 65%HitChance x 26,4 = 17,16 Dmg
That makes a total Dmg of 43,62 per round.
101,5HP / 43,62 Dmg = 2,33 rounds until the Ranger has 0HP
Ranger hits fighter:
1.Attack: 85%HitChance x 15,5 = 13,175 Dmg
2.Attack: 85%HitChance x 15,5 = 13,175 Dmg
3.Attack: 60%HitChance x 15,5 = 9,3 Dmg
4.Attack: 60%HitChance x 15,5 = 9,3 Dmg
That makes a total Dmg of 44,95 per round.
124,5HP / 44,95 Dmg = 2,77 rounds until the fighter has 0HP
So we can see that the Fighter is much stronger than the Ranger. And this is with the +6 Favored Enemy Bonus!!! Oh and the animal companion wouldn`t help at all. He would be death after one single strike and would have a 5% chance of hitting....
So what did this all say to us? Well the fighter needs no more boosts ( and believe me i never thought that i would say something like this. Normally i`m one of the guys who say: give more to the fighter...). He fights as good as the Barbarian and the Paladin and a buffed up War Cleric(i`ll post this fights in a day). But the Barbarian, Paladin and Cleric can maintain their Power only a few rounds (ok the cleric can do this veeeeeery long on lvl10...). The Ranger on the other Hand needs some boosting because he seriously lacks in power. Even with a sesond toughness feat instead of the two weapon defense he would last only for 2,47 rounds (which also prooves that toughness is a little to strong but there will be another time and place to discuss this).
Ok if someone wants to know what changes i`ll do with our campaign, here they are:
Fighter:
he will have the possibility to change feats (though i didn`t figure out the exact mechanic of this)
he will get a CMB (perhaps ½ or 1/3 of his level)
one additional class skill
an ability with which he can analyse his enemy (like in BESM D20)
Barbarian
no medium armor proficiency besides hide armor. I mean the Berserkers from the vikings or the germanic tribes fought naked or anly with trousers.
He gets the endurance feat ( i`m a big fan of the conan jogging if you know what i mean :)
im considering giving him more ragepoints (eventually 3 or 4 points + Con per level)
he cannot use his healing power when only his temporary hit points hold him above 0 HP. I think this ability undermines the temporary HP idea. Imho its much cooler this way: the barbarian was hit by a strike which would render a normal human unconscius but because of his rage he can strike back and kills the enemy fighter just before fading away.
Ranger:
He gets +1AC every time he chosses a favored terrain in addition to the initiative bonus
He gets the selfsufficient talent at lvl1 (i mean its a ranger right?)
instead of the animal companion he can choose a domain (like the druid)
the power of his animal companion is ranger lvl -3
Ranger gets the medium armor proficiency
Ok this were my 2cp. Everyone who read all of this is a real hero :)
So what do you think? are the changes ok? Any mistakes i`ve made?
THX
If one of these guys could win an entire round earlier then I would say he had a significant advantage.
Then wait till i post the monk vs. fighter fight. The monk is really weak......
And well my tolerance is about 0.25 rounds. Mainly because the fighter fights always at 100% combat power whereas the other classes fight only for few rounds with ther maximal efficiency (paladin,monk,barbarian) or it is luck depending (ranger,paladin).So i just feel not well when the ranger who is very luck depending needs almost half a round longer to defeat the fighter.
Its also because these fights last only for 3 rounds max. So half a round is pretty much i think.
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THX
Then wait till i post the monk vs. fighter fight. The monk is really weak......
This... will surprise almost nobody. ;)
And well my tolerance is about 0.25 rounds. Mainly because the fighter fights always at 100% combat power whereas the other classes fight only for few rounds with ther maximal efficiency (paladin,monk,barbarian) or it is luck depending (ranger,paladin).
So i just feel not well when the ranger who is very luck depending needs almost half a round longer to defeat the fighter.
Its also because these fights last only for 3 rounds max. So half a round is pretty much i think.
I guess I don't have much problem with the ranger having a niche other than primary front line.
Sam
Ok here i have to admit that i regard almost every class as a combat oriented class. First i look at the combat capabilities than comes the rest. Must be the strategie games legacy :)
Thanks again. Especially for the critique.
Well the race was human but i thought that a lvl10 human would have 5 feats: 2 at lvl1 +3 for 3rd,6th and 9th level.
I used the pathfinder pointbuy with 25 points. That gave the Fighter and Barbarian St 16 Con 16 Dex 14 Wi10 Int10 Cha10 +2St for Human +2St for levels 4 and 8. The Ranger had St 16 Con 14 Dex 15 Wi13 Int10 Cha10 +2St for Human +2St for levels 4 and 8 (St18 was a typo he has a St of 20)
The Toughness feat can no longer be taken multiple times.
It can't? Must have missed this, thx. Do you perhaps know where i can find this in the rulebook. Because i was searching for it before i made the chars and could not find anything.
The whole equation might change drastically with the availability of Vital Strike and Devastating Blow at BAB 11.
Very good point. I will make some level 11 chars and will post them tomorrow or the day after.
Imho Improved Critical is only a so-so feat, even if there was no equivalent weapon enchantment.
Well partially i agree. On low levels when the damage output is small it is a bad feat. On high levels with high damage output it is very good. Applied to a greatsword it gives you a damage boost of 10%. So if your damage is higher than 20 it is superior to weapon specialisation.
Also Weapon Focus is imho not worth it if you do not take at least 4 fighter levels.
Here i disagree. I mean with 4 fighter levels you basically take it twice which doesn't make the single feat better.
A Barbarian with Dodge, Mobility, Spring Attack and Overhand Chop could've had +2 AC more and, if he survived the first round and given enough room, probably made mincemeat out of the fighter.
as for dodge this is true. As i didn't use powerattack (made the damage output smaller) i could have substituted it with dodge. But the change would be minor: the fighter would have a 95%attack and a 90%attack.
For the guerilla tactic: well it is possible that that would make the barbarian even stronger but it is kind of hard to calculate (at least for me :). But i'm not really sure about this. The Barbarian would lose one attack (and his 3rd attack is the main reason why he's stronger than the Fighter. The Fighter would also loose one Attack but only if he looses initiative. If he wins then he can just ready his action and make his full attack when the Barbarian comes near.Also a ranged combat Ranger with Boots of Striding and Springing would probably have he upper hand.
This is true but i intentionally made them melee warriors because ranged warriors will generally always have the upper hand when they are far away or when they are fast enough or when they can fly. I mean that was the main reason why ranged weapons were invented right? ;)
How about a performance analysis against set CL monster encounters?
This is definitely something i'm planing to do. The only problem is that i've got little time at the moment. Stupid exams..... But what monsters have you in mind? As i said i'm relatively new to 3.x so what are the "standard" monsters?
Oh and any ideas what feat i can take instead og the fighters 2nd toughness feat? I'm kind of running low on feats which i can give to the fighter and which are numeric feats (with bonuses etc.).
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For the record, this analysis is entirely predicated on the concept of damage/round as a means of determining combat effectiveness. The monk, for instance, is incredibly bad at this - but is currently the melee class most able to debuff the opponent, stripping actions away while dealing damage. This might well impact their utility without being apparent in this kind of test at all.
For the record, this analysis is entirely predicated on the concept of damage/round as a means of determining combat effectiveness. The monk, for instance, is incredibly bad at this - but is currently the melee class most able to debuff the opponent, stripping actions away while dealing damage. This might well impact their utility without being apparent in this kind of test at all.
This is entirely true. But it is hard to calculate feats/attacks with special effects so i stick to the attacks/feats which grant extra damage/to-hit-chances etc. For example: out of curiosity i made a fight between the fighter and the rogue and even the bleeding ability (which is numerical) gave me a major headache.
And for the monk well: Fighter vs. Monk 2,11 rounds. Monk vs. Fighter 4,11 rounds.... even the best debuffing abilities cannot make up for a difference this high.|
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And for the monk well: Fighter vs. Monk 2,11 rounds. Monk vs. Fighter 4,11 rounds.... even the best debuffing abilities cannot make up for a difference this high.
If the fighter drops to only making standard actions, rather than full attacks, each round, or is completely unable to attack at all? It certainly might. (Not that I'm saying that the fighter is going to do so, necessarily - the monk's abilities do have saves, after all - but it's part of the equation.)
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a part of me says that this test is slanted to make the Fighter look better, but even if it isnt it still doesnt address that the Fighter is as boring as sin in actual gameplay. even if he could go toe to toe with a barbarian in melee. The Barbarians faster, more skilled, aware and able to get any feat that is worthwhile that a Fighter could. Rage abilities are also an important addition to this matchup (they are feats unto themselves) giving the Barbarian a definite edge.
a part of me says that this test is slanted to make the Fighter look better
well to be honest my intention when i came up with this whole math idea was to make the fighter (especially in comparison to the Barbarian) look worse....after all the fighter is my favourite class and i wanted some numbers to undermine my wish for boosting him. But when i was done i was really suprised how strong he actually is.
And with the Barbarian you are right. He is indeed stronger than the fighter. As my analysis has shown a Barbarian would defeat a fighter in a duell.The only problem is that the other warrior classes are inferior to the fighter and i see very little threads which adress this. Most of them are about giving the fighter more. I have too admit that the fighter should have some uses outside of combat, i just don't like that people still want to boost his damage etc. without considering that that would make the other warrior classes weaker.
There is always this fighter vs. wizard comparison but instead it should be a Warrior Class vs. Wizard comparison.
When i think about the Ranger or the Paladin i still have the 2nd ed versions in mind which were basically fighters with some extra abilities. When i play a ranger or a paladin i see them primary as frontline warriors which should contribute to the fight as strong as the fighter. Things like tracking or beeing able to heal someone are nice for fluff outside the combat but their main niche is smashing things with a piece of metal. But i know this are mainly my preferences and other people have of course other preferences and another opinion. (would be boring if not he? :)
@Shisumo. Well might be true i never played a monk so i do not really know all the good debuffing combos. If the fighter would lose his full attack action every round thus making only half his damage (though he probably would make more because he would loose his weaker second attack) then the monk would be on par with the fighter. With debuffing you mean the unarmed feat tree right? I'll look into them. Perhaps i can figure something out how to take them into the calculation.
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a part of me says that this test is slanted to make the Fighter look better, but even if it isnt it still doesnt address that the Fighter is as boring as sin in actual gameplay. even if he could go toe to toe with a barbarian in melee. The Barbarians faster, more skilled, aware and able to get any feat that is worthwhile that a Fighter could. Rage abilities are also an important addition to this matchup (they are feats unto themselves) giving the Barbarian a definite edge.
It's up to you as the player to make the Fighter fun to play...
The Fighter is Tabula Rasa...a blank slate...
My wife made an extremely fun fighter through role-playing during my Savage Tide AP...she was basically very very chaotic, sometimes taking an action just to destroy something instead of attacking...tha party was a little bonkers anyway, they had a rogue/cleric that wasn't a very good rogue, nor a healer...he actually let one of the other players die instead of healing him...and he wasn't evil, just neutral.
@Tholas: feat at every even level? damn....i should learn to read more carefully. Oh and that with 13.000gps was my fault. i just used the wealth guide for our actual campaign (very low magic) forgetting that this was a houserule...ok seems like i have to do the calculations a second time....but thx for pointing this out. would have never noticed this myself.
I'll answer the rest tomorrow if its ok. I really need to get some sleep now. good night good fight
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For the record, this analysis is entirely predicated on the concept of damage/round as a means of determining combat effectiveness. The monk, for instance, is incredibly bad at this - but is currently the melee class most able to debuff the opponent, stripping actions away while dealing damage. This might well impact their utility without being apparent in this kind of test at all.
For the most part I agree with you.
These kinds of expected damage calculations do have their uses, and I think they're easier to use to model the behavior of feats than to predict the outcome of fights.
These kind of calculations can be used to model the kinds of abilities you point out, but their difficulty jumps from being merely tedious to challenging.
Sam
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The whole equation might change drastically with the availability of Vital Strike and Devastating Blow at BAB 11.
Imho Improved Critical is only a so-so feat, even if there was no equivalent weapon enchantment.
I've been running expected damage vs. AC calculations for two-handed weapons for the last week and it appears that Devastating Blow is a very worthwhile feat. Vital Strike doesn't always do very well. I'm kind of surprised.
Also Weapon Focus is imho not worth it if you do not take at least 4 fighter levels.
From what I've seen so far, Weapon Focus does more to improve expected damage then Improved Vital Strike and sometimes more then Vital Strike. One of the main problems with Improved Vital Strike is that you're giving up an attack that already has extra dice on it from Vital Strike.
I suspect the Vital Strike tree may perform better for two weapon fighters. I'll run those graphs next.
Once I'm comfortable that I've investigated enough, I'll post my numbers and graphs online. Probably over at EN World or I'll gin up a blog account if that doesn't work.
Sam
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For Vital Strike to be effective it really depends on the weapons base damage and the ammount of bonus damage you add on top. Utilized with most high damage 2h weapons it gives a good return.
I'm running most of these calculations with the greatsword. It's a common choice for this kind of character so it's a good place to start when investigating the behavior of this kind of feat. The test character is a 17th level fighter with a +5 greatsword and the typical sword saint feat list.
Imho Devastating Blow is a tad too good with x3 weapons and outright broken with x4 weapons.
Vital Strike can get brutal in higher level Monk/Fighter builds combined with a Monk's Robe.
When considering the kind of foes a high level character will face, I'd go with just saying good rather than broken.
It'll be a while before I examine the monk.
Yes, but the effectiveness of (Improved) Vital Strike, also depends heavily on your hit probability against an enemy. If you already need 15 or more on your first attack it's a good choice, if you can hit it with a 5 you're most likely better off without it.
For this test character 15 is the upper cut off. At 16 Vital Strike(VS) pulls ahead of Improved Vital Strike(IVS) again. From 8 to 15 on the first attack IVS does better then VS. Below that VS gives the best expected damage results until the subsequent attacks really start kicking in and the regular full attack and finally power attack become the best bets. At no point for this test does IVS do better then VS if you can somehow get an additional +1 to hit on that VS from somewhere instead.
I rather doubt it, without allowing an Oversized Two-Weapon Fighting like feat there is no good off-hand weapon apart from the Sun Sword. Without running numbers my gut feeling is that it might not perform worse if you get Bastard Sword or Dwarven Waraxe Exotic Weapon Proficiency.
I'll test it anyway. I'll go with the traditional long sword & short sword, since that's what most people choose. I considered the picks, but that kind of thing sends the wrong message. I'm just testing the behavior of the feats.
I will test the high crit choices, just like I'll test the scythe and falchion for the two-hander. I'll just not focus on them.
I really look forward to that. :)
I'll post a link around here somewhere. Once the playtest moves to feats, I'll post a summary and link in that forum.
Edit: Did you include Backswing into your analysis? Imho it is a must have feat with any high strength full attacking build and it significantly shifts the amount of damage per round toward the first attack.
Yes. I've included Backswing.
I haven't tested high strength yet. The test character only has Str: 26. Well within range for a non-optimized character. Typical of how these characters are usually played.
Sam
Well, the "Special: A character may gain this feat multiple times. Its effects stack." sentence is gone.
Oh, right. Didn't consider this...
True, but on lower levels you can take better feats and on high levels the keen enchantment or a scabbard of keen edge is easy to come by. Imho the feat needs a boost but just allowing it to stack with enchantments might lead to balance issues.
Well its true that a keen enchantment is easy to come by, but on the other side you could spend the money for something else.
What better feats do you have in mind? If you mean trip and co. its true, but its hard (if not using splatbooks) to find enough numerical feats for the fighter and his huge amount of feats.Imho it's only worth it if you have feats to spare(=fighter) and you aim for (Greater)Weapon Specialization.I think it depends. If you have many Attacks or if you make much damage or if you have a relatively low attack bonus it's good i think. I mean its 5% more damage.
Edit: Ok i have to admit that after reading this (5%more dmg) i begin to wonder if its really so good.
Imho letting two build slugging it out at close range doesn't give a good evaluation of a class. A mobile melee build will most likely loose against a heavy armored fighter.
It is as you said. It's different to compare such different builds in this evaluation. But it wasn't intended to test how a skirmisher Barbarian would do against a Heavy Infantry Fighter but to find out how a Heavy Infantry Barbarian would do against a Heavy Infantry Fighter etc. But i'll thanks for the skirmishing tips. My actual char is a Ranger/Barbarian and in think i'll multiclass into wildrunner and try spring attack and co. out.
As far as I understand the rules you can't take a ready action to attack someone doing a spring attack(not sure).
Edit: After rereading the rules you probably can ready an single standard action to hit an spring attacking opponent
After reading it again: Yeah you're right. Must have been another houserule i forgot about :)
I'll post a link around here somewhere. Once the playtest moves to feats, I'll post a summary and link in that forum.
Can't wait to see them :)
I'm really glad that there are other people who had the same idea. At first i expected that there would be many people who would be uncomfortable with this kind of analysis.And by the way with the now bigger amount of feats avaiable to all classes i'm kind of feeling that the fighter might lose a little of his supremacy. I mean now all the classes can take the best feats. what do you think?
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I think it depends. If you have many Attacks or if you make much damage or if you have a relatively low attack bonus it's good i think. I mean its 5% more damage.
Edit: Ok i have to admit that after reading this (5%more dmg) i begin to wonder if its really so good.
My suggestion is to plot your expected damage calculations against AC without using Weapon Focus. Next add a line to the graph including Weapon Focus. After that add a line for some other damage increasing feat. Then you're not going to have to wonder anymore, you'll have it right there on your screen. :)
It's good to have +1 to hit, but what I think the others are getting at is that some tactical feats can offer more return than that, so they're better to take for the specialist.
Can't wait to see them :)
I'm really glad that there are other people who had the same idea. At first i expected that there would be many people who would be uncomfortable with this kind of analysis.And by the way with the now bigger amount of feats avaiable to all classes i'm kind of feeling that the fighter might lose a little of his supremacy. I mean now all the classes can take the best feats. what do you think?
These calculations were more common in the earlier days of D20 when people were wrapping their heads around Power Attack.
I'm not too worried about how the fighter stacks up against other melee classes. Weapon Training and Armor Training give him a big boost. I still worry a bit about the higher levels though. He needs some help there. The Paizo folks say they'll add some interesting feats, so we'll see.
Sam