Casters have defenses too, you know. A wizard with, say, mirror image or stoneskin on doesn't detonate instantly upon being attacked. And that's not even taking into account things like high AC sorcerer or druid builds. And even if my wizard takes a hit... hm... checking the rules... nope, not instantly dead. Apparently I get HP too.
Both those spells last minutes. Who's protecting you while your busy buffing yourself for 2 rounds? Or did your GM announce that a fight was about to happen?
If your Sorc or Druid have a high AC, you probably sacked something else. And your wizard with his d6 HD and low ass Con score is ok taking hits to the face? Sort of doubt it.
Why do people always assume that the monsters are going to always fail the spell DC? I have made and played with fairly optimized casters and usually the biggest issue and one of the things you spend a vast majority of your resources towards (feats, traits, magic items, etc.) is getting that DC up. But even then the monsters still make the DC fairly often...
Because I guess people typically play without monsters having save items and buff spells and the advanced simple template and other stuff. Same with always beating Spell Resistance, apparently all spells are supposed to have the Piercing meta-magic feat or Dweomer's Essence applied to them.
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Folks typically don't like feeling like their characers are trivialized. This can take many forms, ranging from being outshone in your niche to feeling left in the dust in those areas where one tries to branch out beyond combat. And then there's the difference in narrative weight to throw around. This doesn't happen in every game, but it does happen in some, and it can be hard not to get a bit bitter about it.
Curious about what Mythic might offer in that area...
Stoneskin lasts 10min/level, and Mirror Image is low enough you can have plenty of castings. Lots of other defensive spells that last quite a while.
Druids, Summoners, Clerics, and Oracles can all do a great job of replacing martials. They have good summons, Druids have their AC, and then they have buffs. Summoners, of course, do this best from the back, but their Eidolon or Summons can be out pretty much all the time.
At mid to high levels, it is easy to avoid needing AC to have a good defense. You just stack a lot of difference kinds of forced miss chance like Displacement and Mirror Image. Add to those summons, and area spells that incapacitate enemies and you are pretty darn safe.
I suspect you've never seen a caster really played to the hilt.
Buff buff buff buff buff. Why do you have all these rounds to buff unmolested?
Stoneskin lasts 3 hours and 20 minutes at level 20. That's out of 8 hours of adventuring. Aaand it has an expensive material component. Why do you have all this money to burn?
Summons only last rounds and take 1 round to cast. How did you get this free time? Does the door have a big "the boss is behind here" sign?
I don't enjoy "janitor work". However "invaluable" my coup de grace on the sleeping giant was, it doesn't change the fact that I had little to do with winning that encounter. It was won when the caster pulled a Sleep spell out of his ass.That's why people use the phrase. Not as a jab at martial characters so much as a statement of disgust at the way casters can sometimes trivialize encounters.
This.
There was a time when RPGs worked like the op described and back then I loved playing martials. Now it changed, martials are on mop up duty most of the time and I started playing casters.
It's sad bus as the rules are the martials would be better of being cohorts. They are good to have around but not viable PCs anymore.
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i simply think there is a vast difference between pfs/modules and people who create there own adventures.
Of course there is, and it is not a bad thing. But there is just as much difference between two people who create their own adventures. And none of it changes the facts of the game as written, regardless of what you think those facts are.
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I don't know what more you want out of a martial. They hit hard and are tanky. What more do you want?
I want hitting hard and being tanky to actually matter.
Almost every class can be built to hit hard enough and tank well enough to cover necessities.
Then, when combat's over, the guy who did slightly more damage and had slightly more "tankiness" sits around idly, sticking his two skill ranks up his butt, while the spellcasters take care of everything else the game has to throw at them other than dealing hit point damage.
Imagine this:
There are ten doors arrayed in front of you, each locked with a different key. You can choose between a ring with a single key on it for the first door that will work in the lock smoothly and always open it with no hassle, or a ring with all 10 keys on it, but the one for the first door is a little rusty and misshapen, so you kind of have to work it in the lock and jiggle it a bit.
Which key ring do you wager is better to have?
And I expect an answer other than something smarmy about kicking in the other doors with your awesome Fighter strength (which is silly, because every class gets the same benefit from Strength as every other, so Fighters are no stronger than any other class with the same stat--something that was not always true in the history of D&D, and when it wasn't, Fighters were a lot better off).
And your wizard with his d6 HD and low ass Con score is ok taking hits to the face? Sort of doubt it.
Why is the wizard's Con score "low ass?" I don't understand these arguments.
"Stereotypical stat placement makes your class suck!"
"Uh, can't I put my stats in smarter places, then?"
"NO! That's cheating! Only Fighters can put the most points in Strength and Con!"
Martial characters are quite viable in games without casters, or at least without certain KINDS of casters.
The most fun I've had is in games where the only casters are blasters, buffers, and even utility (while I think martial characters should get some utility of their own, I don't REALLY begrudge the caster with Fly who does his thing and all).
It's when you get casters that start doing ludicrous amounts of debuffs or enemy trivializing spells like Sleep and its higher level, similar but different ilk that the fun goes away in my eyes.
While the imbalance is still there, it doesn't detract from the fun of most characters if the Wizard can cast Spider Climb on a guy when we need to climb something (except the Rogue's. Poor Rogueie.) or chuck a fireball to soften up the crowd.
It's when exactly how powerful and versatile they can be is shoved in your face with super summoners and enemy debilitators that the fun just kind of melts into the wind for everyone but the caster (and hell, even them a lot of the time).
Now the game I'm in currently kinda has the best of both worlds in that as the only "tank" I'm a bit more in demand since the casters have ENTIRELY neglected defenses (the Witch and the Sorcerer have like 12 AC each and we're level 11. It's funny). My Barbarian has 3 times the HP of the next nearest character (the Druid). They don't trivialize encounters, they soften them up and the Druid, the monk, and I knock them over.
Casters are not bad for the game in and of themselves if the players specifically limit themselves is what I'm saying.
And STILL my Barbarian is like "So...what do I do now?" once combat's over. He's got Linguistics out the wazoo in an attempt to have some utility, but I wasn't told there was a Witch with even more languages than I've got, so that's out. Climb? Swim? Nuh-uh. Overland Flight is an always going thing for the Witch every day, and the Druid can turn into an eagle or dolphin or something any time she wants, so that's out.
Perception? Druid's got a much higher Wis.
Survival? Haven't had to track a damn thing yet.
Most skills in the game are either obsoleted by spells, or taken by the casters anyway, is my point, so out of combat isn't a thing martials do particularly well, besides MAYBE Rangers since they can actually fight.
So the in combat thing is all that's left. Which is a'ight. Until the casters cut loose.
Cleaning up is honest work, not a lesser contribution.When you start feeling that this is "lesser" just fire the people that do this job for your company. Very soon you will learn that they are critical to any endeavour.
If cleaning is no lesser job, why doesn't the cleaning woman earn more?
I'm glad we have them in our company but I'm damn sure glad I'm not one of them because I wouldn't want to do this job.And in the same line I don't want to be on mop up duty in RPG games even if they earn the same as everyone else.
Why do people always assume that the monsters are going to always fail the spell DC? I have made and played with fairly optimized casters and usually the biggest issue and one of the things you spend a vast majority of your resources towards (feats, traits, magic items, etc.) is getting that DC up. But even then the monsters still make the DC fairly often...
That's what save AND suck spells are for.
I rarely use spells that do nothing on a save. Rime spell + cold damage spell for near certain entangle, ray of exhaustion for at least fatigued, suffocation for at least 3 rounds staggered. I could go on but I think you get the idea.
Buff buff buff buff buff. Why do you have all these rounds to buff unmolested?Stoneskin lasts 3 hours and 20 minutes at level 20. That's out of 8 hours of adventuring. Aaand it has an expensive material component. Why do you have all this money to burn?
Summons only last rounds and take 1 round to cast. How did you get this free time? Does the door have a big "the boss is behind here" sign?
No need to buff so much when your caster has the most hp in the party. Sure my AC isn't as high as the martial's but then I can just cast some spells to get rid of those annoying enemies who want to melee. Or debuff them so bad they can't hit my low AC.
I even tanked one boss battle because he wat attacking touch AC so armor didn't matter and our martials were busy running around feared. Casters can be squishy but they don't have to be.
Perception? Druid's got a much higher Wis.
Survival? Haven't had to track a damn thing yet.
Most skills in the game are either obsoleted by spells, or taken by the casters anyway, is my point, so out of combat isn't a thing martials do particularly well, besides MAYBE Rangers since they can actually fight.
So the in combat thing is all that's left. Which is a'ight. Until the casters cut loose.
My fighters tend to have better perception than the druid.
Martials wreck combat. Ofcourse people on these forums will smugly call it janitorial work while I would call it doing the real work, but semantics.
I don't know what more you want out of a martial. They hit hard and are tanky. What more do you want?Stuff. I want them to do stuff. Most importantly I'd like them to play a role outside of combat and not be overshadowed(or even replaced!) by casters. I don't think its a problem with casters, I think casters could be nerfed from all powerful because I don't need my campaign torn apart or planned around them, but I think the martials could use a tune-up.
Edit: And as another poster above put it--I don't say this because I hate martials or have contempt for them. In truth, I prefer them thematically, and wish I could enjoy them mechanically. I want them to be better. I want them to be necessary and important and do something nobody else can do. But the confines of 3rd edition D&D just do not allow that.** spoiler omitted **...Again, you dodge around the issue but you still haven't answered the question. What specifically do you want to make your martial feel the requisite amount of special? Is it spellcasting? You've got the Paladin and Ranger. Is it arcane spellcasting, you've got the Magus. Unless you're going Eldritch Knight, but he's not a Martial, he's a Wizard who's got a thing for blades.
The Martials on our tables don't feel the lack of special, given that they get most of the glory moments of combat. Outside of combat.. that's the thing called roleplaying and for the most part, it has very little to with character mechanics.
The second part of your post is an argument against the first part of your post. I have little to add.
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Martials? Yeah, you could say that I'm a fan...
Stoneskin lasts 10min/level, and Mirror Image is low enough you can have plenty of castings. Lots of other defensive spells that last quite a while.
Druids, Summoners, Clerics, and Oracles can all do a great job of replacing martials. They have good summons, Druids have their AC, and then they have buffs. Summoners, of course, do this best from the back, but their Eidolon or Summons can be out pretty much all the time.
At mid to high levels, it is easy to avoid needing AC to have a good defense. You just stack a lot of difference kinds of forced miss chance like Displacement and Mirror Image. Add to those summons, and area spells that incapacitate enemies and you are pretty darn safe.
I suspect you've never seen a caster really played to the hilt.
Buff buff buff buff buff. Why do you have all these rounds to buff unmolested?
Stoneskin lasts 3 hours and 20 minutes at level 20. That's out of 8 hours of adventuring. Aaand it has an expensive material component. Why do you have all this money to burn?
Summons only last rounds and take 1 round to cast. How did you get this free time? Does the door have a big "the boss is behind here" sign?
You really seem to lack a bit of understanding of the system. How can they buff? Easy. Quicken metamagic/rod. Divination spells mean that most of the time a well played caster knows exactly when he needs to be buffed so getting the mid to long duration buffs up is easy.
Why do they have money to burn? Because they are casters and thus can function on minimal gear. How many cast of stone skin does the cost of a +2 sword get you? A bunch.
Since when is a full round cast such a massively long time? In that time the melee's are just getting into full attack position if they are lucky.
All this leaves out time stop that flat gives all the time a caster could want.
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I'd argue that the "lack of respect for martials" is in the rules and on the part of the designers, not on the part of the people who want to make them full participants.
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Martials? Yeah, you could say that I'm a fan...
Ha, look at the sword jockey! It thinks it's people! Now dance! Dance for your magical overlord's amusement!
*casts Irresistible Dance*
Martials? Yeah, you could say that I'm a fan...Ha, look at the sword jockey! It thinks it's people! Now dance! Dance for your magical overlord's amusement!
*casts Irresistible Dance*
pffffffffft!
My preference for martial characters should be taken with the perspective that 1) I have never been someone who indulges in the all-consuming quest for balance in games, 2) I see gaming as something cooperative between players rather than competitive - I'm not going to complain when my team adds a superstar to its roster - and 3) I rarely see play past 12th level.
I'm also very good at both building and playing martial characters, which in my experience is far more 'unbalancing' than game design could ever be.
It's a commonplace event for the groups I see to have at most one front-line fighter, if that much... and if one's not available, the cleric or bard gets pressed into service to take the 'grunt work' job.
Everyone else is doing casters, or archers, or rogue/monk combos that trip and then stand back, waiting for someone else to actually deliver some damage.
I fully expect to see a group soon with NO combatants whatsoever: just a lot of players standing around saying "You attack him, nuh-uh, YOU have to attack him, I attacked last time."
If you're not willing to deal some damage to the monsters, why did you make a character and show up to the table?
We had a Second Darkness group that featured no full martials at all and was ridiculously potent: A Summoner (mounted), a Master Summoner (the two were twins), a Void Mage and an Arcane Duelist. Crazy, crazy effective.
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Outside of combat.. that's the thing called roleplaying and for the most part, it has very little to with character mechanics.
If the things you do outside of combat actually matter then they absolutely should involve character mechanics. Feel free to jabber on about pop culture references in a fake accent for as long as you like though.
I'm some-what blind posting here, but at the end of the day, it's a team game, the goal is to work together to get through encounters. I'm playing a battle cleric and my friend is the party wizard and we do two different things. My GM spreads enemies out so he doesn't take them all out with one spell and sometimes even has enemies call me out for duels while the wizard and TWF Fighter take on other enemies.
At the end of the day, I'm excited when he does something impressive like trap half the enemies in a pit and he gets a kick out of me critting the face off a big Undead Minotaur that rose out of the ground right behind him.
I fully intend to play a Fighter next game just because everyone is so down on it.
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I'm some-what blind posting here, but at the end of the day, it's a team game, the goal is to work together to get through encounters. I'm playing a battle cleric and my friend is the party wizard and we do two different things. My GM spreads enemies out so he doesn't take them all out with one spell and sometimes even has enemies call me out for duels while the wizard and TWF Fighter take on other enemies.
At the end of the day, I'm excited when he does something impressive like trap half the enemies in a pit and he gets a kick out of me critting the face off a big Undead Minotaur that rose out of the ground right behind him.
I fully intend to play a Fighter next game just because everyone is so down on it.
I liken it to the Luke Skywalker/Han Solo thing... Luke is infinitely more powerful than Han, but the story has a place for both, a need for both, and I personally grew up wanting to be Solo. Nobody who walked out of the theater - and that's what RP is, interactive storytelling - nobody walked out complaining that Luke was too powerful or that Solo was gimped. Different people have different gifts and those gifts aren't always balanced. Its what you do with what you have that matters.
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You really seem to lack a bit of understanding of the system. How can they buff? Easy. Quicken metamagic/rod. Divination spells mean that most of the time a well played caster knows exactly when he needs to be buffed so getting the mid to long duration buffs up is easy.
I do fail to understand how the caster always has just the right item for the job. Or just the right feat. Or just the right spell. A spell which the player.
A "well played caster" apparently Scrys every room he goes into before entering. This somehow does not decrease his spells/day. He then buff himself before every battle. This somehow does not decrease his spells/day. Thus he can use this strategy and still have a full adventuring day because he's just that awesome.
OR he buffs during battle where the enemies don't walk up and make him pay for it. Is it because the martials are in front of him, blocking (and killing) so that he has that time? Nope, he's so awesome the enemies wait til he's done. I really don't understand that system, you're right.
Why do they have money to burn? Because they are casters and thus can function on minimal gear. How many cast of stone skin does the cost of a +2 sword get you? A bunch.
A second ago the caster had a metamagic rod. One of the most expensive ones too. But now he has "minimal gear". It seems that casters simultaneously have "the right item for the right job" and "no items because they're casters and have spells for that".
Since when is a full round cast such a massively long time? In that time the melee's are just getting into full attack position if they are lucky.
All this leaves out time stop that flat gives all the time a caster could want.
Full attack position INFRONT of the caster so the enemies don't swarm and kill him. That's a job worth lauding don't you think?
No need to buff so much when your caster has the most hp in the party. Sure my AC isn't as high as the martial's but then I can just cast some spells to get rid of those annoying enemies who want to melee. Or debuff them so bad they can't hit my low AC.
I even tanked one boss battle because he wat attacking touch AC so armor didn't matter and our martials were busy running around feared. Casters can be squishy but they don't have to be.
How did you get more HP than martials? Did they sack CON? All things being equal, they're rolling a higher HD than you and should have more on that alone.
And since you admit your AC is lower, you're hit more often making it, at best, a wash. I assume you weren't in the front, with the martials, all the time?
One of the differences between earlier editions and third is that only martial classes, especially the fighter, received a high number of attacks.
How would or could this work in 3E with full BAB classes versus others?
I'm thinking in particular of how it might impact the monk or wildshape, but it's possible there are other ways that could be handled.
It's not my fault that all of those discussions have been wrong.Casters are OP and all their weaknesses are DM fiat when exploited.Something I have to throw out there, There is less permission for GM's to have Random encounters these days, Then in the past games I've played 20 years back.
Random Encounters can disrupt sleep and meditation time to get spells back.Oberoni fallacy much? There have literally been hundreds (thousands?) of discussions on caster/martial disparity since 3.0 debuted. I think it's safe to say that some of the people who believe the game is unbalanced have actually played in real games, and have actually had competent DMs. My DM's been running games for a long time, and if casters are giving him a headache then it's not because he sucks at it. Just sayin.
Hell, it's not like casters are uniquely vulnerable to ambushes. Or does your fighter bathe in full plate?
Ha! Why am I so terrible at recognizing trolling when I see it? Nicely done!
I like playing both martials and casters, and I don't think either are inferior. Sure a caster can do everything on their own for 1 encounter or two a day, but what will they do once they've burned three quarters of their spells? Martials have the staying power to go 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 encounters in a single day if need be.
As for martials and the percieved inability to roleplay them, my 12th level Fighter 3/ Sorcerer 2/ Dragon Disciple 7 will have to completely disagree. Dispite having only 3 skill ranks per level and being at 3rd level spells (all of which, are pre-combat buffs), I find him making lots of group decisions and coming up with tactics as often as the casters, if not more. Maybe it's my personality as much as anything else, but I refuse to sit around waiting for the next fight to come up just because I'm a (primarily) martial character.
You want a wall spell? I see a table over here that I can stand on it's end and hold out in front of me while I walk down this hallway. You need a knock spell? My 34 strength score says no problem. Thinking about flying up to the top of the building? Why bother, I'll scale it like a ladder and throw you down a knotted rope. Sure, he's not going to outshine the casters in the first fight or two of each day, but by the time we're to the door of the boss and all the casters are running low on spells, he's going to proceed to show them what a sword, a solid strength score, and some decent armor class can get done!
IN a point buy game Con is the wizards 2nd best score. Its actually generally better than the martials because a wizard needs 1 ability score he can literally tank every other score except for dex and con.
As far as buff time goes what caster isn't set up with the best Init. in the group because, once again unlike a martial, he doesn't have to have any specific feats to do his job and can take improved int scorpion familiar that's plus 8 before any traits or dex. So baring the DM rolling exceptionally well he'll go first and have plenty of time to buff.
This is starting to get into "casters must be built a certain way" territory. What if the caster DOESN'T have the highest Init?
Lets run with your claim.
Did some theorycrafting. Level 6 Human Wizard. 20 Int, 17 Dex and 18 Con.
6 + 4X6(24) +5D6(15) +6FAVCLSS = 51HP
Lets take a level 6 Human Fighter. 20 Str, 18 Con, 12 Dex. He doesn't need as much Dex since he can wear armor. So he's got more points to burn which I'll put in Wisdom so he has a better Will save than your Wizard.
10 + 4X6(24) +5D10(25) +6FAVCLSS = 65HP. A significant difference.
The Wizards AC is 21.
+1 Mithral Buckler, +1 RoP, +1 AoNA, +4 Mage Armor, +3 Dex. He's spent 6005gp so he could buy more stuff. It cost spells to keep putting up Mage Armor. Spells he's NOT spending on the enemy.
The Fighters AC is 25.
+1 Full Plate, +1 Mithral Buckler, +1 RoP, +1 AoNA, +1 Dex. He's spent 8655gp so he could buy more stuff.
Without going too much deeper the Wizard has less health and less AC (and less Will). He'll be hit more often and drop sooner if he's buffing and there's no Fighter standing there to block for him.
Bluff, Diplomacy and Sense Motive modifiers aren't the foundation of roleplay.
They aren't the foundation, but they do usually play a part. It would be cool if you had options beyond just being the absolute mundane though, and your skill points/spells definitely add to your out of combat utility. Part of what makes casters powerful is that they have options beyond just hitting things with a stick. Tome of Battle for instance had Stone Hammer, which made a great lockpick because it was an attack that ignored dr/hardenss. That's an example of a game mechanic helping outside of combat. Similarly the Ranger has 6+ skill points per level and puts them around making him great at tracking, perception, a social skill or two, and being able to make knowledge rolls. The fighter with his 2+... tries not to drool I guess?
How did you get more HP than martials? Did they sack CON? All things being equal, they're rolling a higher HD than you and should have more on that alone.
And since you admit your AC is lower, you're hit more often making it, at best, a wash. I assume you weren't in the front, with the martials, all the time?
Usually you tank by having a high con and casting mirror image, blur, and false life or a combination there of. Mage armor last all day too. Conjuration wizards can shift at the end of every turn to avoid a few of those uber deadly full attacks. AC happens to fall behind in value at later levels anyway. Martial characters don't get access to blur, mirror image, or false life, nor anything like it.
Again, you dodge around the issue but you still haven't answered the question. What specifically do you want to make your martial feel the requisite amount of special?
Erm... You didn't ask me a question specifically, so I don't know how I was avoiding. I've said a lot of things about 'lack of respect' or whatever, that post you picked out was a response to Marthkus and mpl. You also have a different idea of what a martial is than me I think, I consider six level casting a caster instead of a martial. Four level aren't very magical, but you can't deny that spell casting helps them.
Anyways, to answer your new question I totally didn't avoid, martials to be special would have to do something special. Clean up crew could be special I guess, but that doesn't sound like a cool and exciting job. Sounds like grunt work. They'd have to do something other people can't, but that's rather vague and could be interpreted in a lot of ways, and I'm never a fan of forced niche. Another thing is options, I really want options. I full attack is like a battlecry. I can say it in a lot of ways but it always gives me the same results. It would be cool if I could do something else with a martial, but that's a different game that pathfinder.
Don't get me wrong, Joe the fighter has all kind of cool roleplaying moments. So does Jeff the commoner, Jed the Barbarian, Joseph the ranger, and Jezelda the sorceress. The fact anyone can role play isn't a great defense for a bad design. It really has nothing to do with what people are talking about. The fact the game supports Jezelda, Jed, and Joseph being awesome outside of combat far more than Joe is kinda meh. Jezelda being a 9th level sorceress being able to do all sorts of neat tricks has more support than Jed the 11th level barbarian.
Why does your martial wizard have a 20 Int?
Higher DCs and more spells?
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I liken it to the Luke Skywalker/Han Solo thing... Luke is infinitely more powerful than Han, but the story has a place for both, a need for both, and I personally grew up wanting to be Solo. Nobody who walked out of the theater - and that's what RP is, interactive storytelling - nobody walked out complaining that Luke was too powerful or that Solo was gimped. Different people have different gifts and those gifts aren't always balanced. Its what you do with what you have that matters.
If, in your group, it's nothing more than storytelling, then your martials get plot immunity and extra screen time at will, and there's no need for you to worry about the rules. Many groups, however, prefer the story to emerge based on playing a game, one with actual rules. In those rules, the martial characters are not only less powerful, they are also less able to influence the story based on their abilities, and are therefore less important to the story.
Imagine if Han had access to (and was able to fly) only a landspeeder in the first movie, instead of the Millenium Falcon, and your analogy will be more exact. Han's place in the story depended on his ship and his ability to fly it: he was the only one in the party able to cast teleport, if you prefer. Martials in PF don't get free artifacts or useful spell effects like that.
Usually you tank by having a high con and casting mirror image, blur, and false life or a combination there of. Mage armor last all day too. Conjuration wizards can shift at the end of every turn to avoid a few of those uber deadly full attacks. AC happens to fall behind in value at later levels anyway. Martial characters don't get access to blur, mirror image, or false life, nor anything like it.
More buff buff buff. Most buffs aren't all day buffs. How are you getting so many spells of midcombat when YOU'RE the tank? You can't Shift away, you have to block.
If you buff precombat, how did you know to do that? How many times do you get to do that? How often do you get to do that?
Martials have the staying power to go 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 encounters in a single day if need be.Martials only have staying power for as long as the wand of cure light has charges.
Which should NEVER be a problem at the levels we're discussing (9+). Sure, things are much different before that, like that wizard only having 6 spells total in a day...
I'm not saying that casters aren't 100% instrumental in getting things done - having a buddy cleric or oracle is a HUGE boon to martial characters, better than a wizard some might argue. Martials aren't worthless - they are plenty capable of contributing all the way up to the highest levels.
And let's quit pretending that hitting things until they fall over isn't pretty much THE biggest portion of the game. It's a rare adventure that doesn't involve combat, and a campaign that didn't involve combat is nigh unthinkable.
That's great at low levels. By the time it gets into the double-digits, combat in my campaigns is so easy to avoid (using spells) and is over so quickly (using divination and rocket-tag effects) that standing around looking for things to hit is obsolete.
Is your martial wizard casting a lot of spells with saves? Or is he casting buffs like mirror image and the like that make DCs irrelevant?
Why not both? Does the Wizard have to choose? Cause barring some specialization a Fighter can do either and often both simultaneously.