Also, anyone who says "fighters can do what they do all day"
Is forgetting something-
HP.
Aye. The lack of HP recovery options for Fighters is bad. Even Barbs have something. Rangers and paladins can, of course, just use wands without having to invest in UMD.
==Aelryinth
Curiously, what if you gave the fighter fast healing?
Say, equal to 1/4th his level?
Would that make him much better?
Would lend itself well to the whole
"I can take down an army on my own"
Feel, if nothing else.
Despite all the negativity, those are more options than the fighter had. So, rather than complain about the wizards choice of action, tell us what the fighter can do maybe?
This is a good description of the problem.
An undead army is coming your way, what do you do?
Caster have many, many different options. Not all of them might work, but many of them will.
- Raise your own undead army
- Teleport/Assassinate/Teleport
- Scry and Fry
- Summon allies.
- Use magic to warn the neighboring kingdoms and request their help
- Use spells such as Wall of stone to better fortify your defenses
- Craft stuff to better arm your solider
- Use mass buffs to improve the performance of your whole army
- Go to battle and blast whole squads of enemies
Now, a Fighter can...
- Go to battle and kill enemies 1 by 1.
That's it. Whatever other options he has were not made possible or even improved by his class features.
Hey, Vincent Takada, you need to change your Avatar. That does not look like a Takada! :).
Father was a samurai, mother was icelandic fey. What can ya do...
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As well a Wizard can use a extend rod to increase the duration of his protection spells. Sure it's only three spells. While hiding behind Vanish or invisbility as a spell. So unless the distance from point a to point b is very long. Or the Wizard is constantly under attack their protection spells can stay on for a very long time.
How does the game change when you remove the wizard? The cleric?
It changes incredibly. Magic items define what unnatural stuff you can do. You can't fly. You can't teleport. You can't summon monsters. You can't toss fireballs, you can't change shape, you can't charm/dominate monsters. You don't have HEALING. You can't be returned video gamish from the dead. You can't buff/immunize yourself against special attacks. That's all now in the province of the enemy, and Craft Wondrous Item/Ring.What happens when you remove fighters and rogues?
Nothing. Alchemists and urban rangers can take care of the trapfinding. You can melee with summoned monsters or the right buffs. You can use different tactics and different spells to end the fighting. Your recovery options are still the same, you can still come back from death..
It doesn't change at all, in fact we have neither a cleric nor a Wizard. We have several oracles, bards and Sorcerers in my three games, but no Wizards or Clerics. We can Fly, T-port, Summon Monsters, Fireballs, etc. We have MORE healing as a Life oracle is a better healer than a cleric.
It doesn't change at all, in fact we have neither a cleric nor a Wizard. We have several oracles, bards and Sorcerers in my three games, but no Wizards or Clerics. We can Fly, T-port, Summon Monsters, Fireballs, etc. We have MORE healing as a Life oracle is a better healer than a cleric.How does the game change when you remove the wizard? The cleric?
It changes incredibly. Magic items define what unnatural stuff you can do. You can't fly. You can't teleport. You can't summon monsters. You can't toss fireballs, you can't change shape, you can't charm/dominate monsters. You don't have HEALING. You can't be returned video gamish from the dead. You can't buff/immunize yourself against special attacks. That's all now in the province of the enemy, and Craft Wondrous Item/Ring.What happens when you remove fighters and rogues?
Nothing. Alchemists and urban rangers can take care of the trapfinding. You can melee with summoned monsters or the right buffs. You can use different tactics and different spells to end the fighting. Your recovery options are still the same, you can still come back from death.
Erm... Oracles and Sorcs are still full casters and very capable. I don't think that's really any different than what Aelrynith said.
2WF isn't worth the resources unless you wield 2 of the same weapon and the weapon has to provide one of the following 2 benefits. either a means to boost survivability, such as the defense and control of the shield, a means to inflict constant debuffs, such as the critical feats combined with a 15 to 20 crit range, or a means to deal nasty damage, whether by your own means, or by proxy through feats such as butterfly sting
sword and board is a practical style in the real world, but not so practical in pathfinder unless you find a way to retain credibility as a threat, which either requires massive damage, or extremely hindering conditions that make the enemy unable to ignore you. just turtling does nothing when the enemy can eat your weak Attack of Opportunity and target the squishies anyway. thing is, to maintain stickyness, the favored methods are damage, control, or conditions. and to guarantee those, you need a larger attack range and a way to more consistently make attacks of opportunity. which both favor reach weapons
ranged combat requires a lot of training, both in the real world, and in pathfinder, in fact, with the exception of 1 frequently banned class that is dissallowed more than even summoners are. the best ranged options are the composite bows, both short and long. long especially so. the benefit of the bow, is you can full attack from nearly any distance, can full attack flying foes without personally needing to fly, and can take pot shots in the opening rounds to stop your enemy from buffing and maybe take a few irksome foes of the map. the downside of archery, is that it is hindered by weather, terrain, water, cover and the like. dexterity is also often a secondary or even tertiary stat for most martial characters, and a lot of newbies neglect archery. a method i recommend for being both viable in melee and ranged combat, is to keep a respectable strength AND dexterity, even if not the highest possible, take both Deadly Aim AND Power Attack. a pair of 16s in these two will do you better than a 7 in one and a 20 in the other. adaptability is important.
finesse weapons, tend to encourage the use of weapon finesse, a trap feat that literally requires an obscure weapon enchantment, or homebrew feat to work. you can kinda make it work with mythic characters, but not very well. and not every DM wants to play with the mythic rules. my advice is the same as with archery, a 16 in both, is better than a 7 strength and 20 dex, if only because, you can also be effective with bows in addition to finesse weapons, you can carry more goods, have better CMB and CMD, and either saved a lot of money on your weapon and a feat or two, or simply saved 2-3 feats.
2handed nonreach weapons, such as greatswords, greataxes and falchions, look cool due to their big damage dice and in some cases, awesome critical effects. the issue with this is, past level 7, every enemy you face will have a reach of at least 10 feet/threaten adjacent. which makes any pouncing attempts or whatever, difficult to pull off without provoking a free swing from the enemy. they also have issues with the synergies of such options as enlarge person plus reach weapon. they look huge on paper, but a lot of times, you are going to have issues closing in to deal the damage, or your enemy is going to laugh because they have a much longer attack range, and can likely fly. try fighting stuff like flying ranged foes like Aboleths, Underwater Nixie Sorcerers, and any encounter against a larger foe on difficult terrain, in these cases, the inability to 5 foot step and full attack has you screwed
2handed reach weapons, combine quite well with spiked gauntlets, armor spikes, braid blades, and now, Cesti or the improved unarmed strike feat. this is the optimal tanking route for combat reflexes, some splitting between strength and dexterity helps, only because those extra attacks are a major damage boost when enlarged. the key is to not gain too many of them. this style also keeps come and get me barbarians alive. 2 16's is better than a 7 in one, 20 in the other.
control through manuevers, nice at the low levels when most of your foes are humanoid, especially trip, disarm, bull rush, and grapple, depending on scenario, but other than these 4 manuevers, which many later foes are resistant or immune to some combination of. there aren't many good manuevers unless you minmax the manuevers, if you do minmax them, you can add steal, feint, cornugon smash, reposition and dirty trick to the list. these usually lose value towards 7th level, and if you can stretch it, can tide you till 10th if you can find a means to both perform them and ensure they will actually land. i'd love to see a manuever rule for grounding flying creatures such as by shooting their wings or whatever.
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You've failed to actually say why you think the game would suffer by giving the Fighter more options.
What harm is there giving the Fighter more mobility? I mean the Barbarian already has pounce and the Fighter has to go with an archetype to cover something even close to pounce?
What harm is there giving the Fighter better skill points? That it might make the Rogue seem even more incompetent as and adventurer?
What harm is there in giving the Fighter better defenses? Does the iconic fighter really have to invest in cloak of resistance to not be completely hosed by will saves?
What harm is there in fixing the HP system so that fighters can be less dependent on magical healing? Is the game really served by making the PCs dependent on healbot clerics and wands/potions of CLW?
What harm is there in making it where the Fighter is less dependent on magic items or spell buffs by incorporating stuff like inherent bonuses (for stuff like the mandatory +1 items) and/or martial buffs like a warrior's trance that functions like some common buff spells?
The game can be incrementally improved for martial players without either adding in too much complexity or too much "magic" so that people's precious verisimilitude can be maintained.
Yes we know that Paizo has no intentions of fixing caster vs martial imbalance in this edition (or possibly a future edition) but fans can still agitate for an improved game.
It doesn't change at all, in fact we have neither a cleric nor a Wizard. We have several oracles, bards and Sorcerers in my three games, but no Wizards or Clerics. We can Fly, T-port, Summon Monsters, Fireballs, etc. We have MORE healing as a Life oracle is a better healer than a cleric.
How does the game change when you remove the wizard? The cleric?
It changes incredibly. Magic items define what unnatural stuff you can do. You can't fly. You can't teleport. You can't summon monsters. You can't toss fireballs, you can't change shape, you can't charm/dominate monsters. You don't have HEALING. You can't be returned video gamish from the dead. You can't buff/immunize yourself against special attacks. That's all now in the province of the enemy, and Craft Wondrous Item/Ring.What happens when you remove fighters and rogues?
Nothing. Alchemists and urban rangers can take care of the trapfinding. You can melee with summoned monsters or the right buffs. You can use different tactics and different spells to end the fighting. Your recovery options are still the same, you can still come back from death..
bards, oracles and sorcerers are highly specialized at what they do, to the extent of forsaking other options the wizard and cleric possess.
the bard can use skills and is an excellent buffer, whom can actually have a better damage output than the rogue when you factor not only his own damage, but the boosted damage of his allies and the amount he increased them by. the bard's damage is done without needing the bard to roll an attack roll, he deals a huge portion of his damage through other people's attack rolls in a stealthy and underappreciated fashion.
the oracle, can be better than the cleric at one or two facets of the cleric's job description, usually at the expense at being unable to perform the other facets. a life oracle whom can both heal and remove conditions, is doing so at a heavy level of investment compared to the cleric, but while the cleric can't heal as well, they will be more likely to possess the corner case spells needed in those rare scenarios that come up more often than expected in actual play than in theory craft. where the oracle shines, is being able to spam the same set of reliable and always useful spells such as heals and buffs for example
the sorcerer can specialize in a facet or two of the wizard's tricks a step further than the wizard. the downsides, are the lack of versatility, the lack of skill points outside of a specific niche bloodline, and the fact they have to be very picky with their spells, choosing tricks with which they will always rely. the wizard's spellbook is indeed more reliable in that it has a tool for most tasks, the wizard progresses faster, has more skill points to spend, has a better casting stat, more choices for dump stats, and nearly the same amount of slots, plus the option of a familiar for action economy and maybe extra initiative. any spell the wizard doesn't wish to prepare, he can scribe on a scroll for half the price a sorcerer would purchase one for, plus they get more benefit out of crafting feats than a sorcerer does due to having an easier time making the skill checks, and having an easier time meeting the requirements.
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Unfortunately limiting casters to x spellpoints or x spell slots a day tends to just heighten the problems of the 15 minute workday because make no mistake the martials are still completely dependent on the casters to function if you are fighting CR appropriate foes.
Also it would just make most casters really dependent on wands which isn't exactly a great solution.
Uncoupling healing from spells (and wands) helps because then the Fighter's core resource management mechanic becomes more controlled by the PC but we still have a large percentage of the fanbase that can't seem to acknowledge that hit points are not meat points.
the best way to balance a caster's narrative power, is not to limit their resources, but to break up the casters into smaller subclasses based on theme but in exchange, drastically increase their resources to compensate.
instead of casters doing everything, they would be limited to a general theme. like Weather Mage, Veiled Seer, or Puppeteer Rather than Wizard. Weather Mage, Veiled Seer and Puppeteer, would be compensated with extra resources and class features to compensate their limited focus. in fact, the less generally useful a classes focus, the more features and resources they get. a Summon Focused Caster would have fewer Resources than a Weather Mage by a huge Margin.
Unfortunately limiting casters to x spellpoints or x spell slots a day tends to just heighten the problems of the 15 minute workdayThe 15 minute work day doesn't exist in PFS play. It shouldn't exist in any proper game, not when it really matters.
that is because of the way the Scenarios are Written, they are intended to be cleared in 4 hour time blocks, and are supposedly thus straightforward, simple, and quite easy from what i heard and the problem classes that cause TPKs for the Party are the ones that nova all day long. encounter design is responsible for a lot of it.
the difficulty, and encounter design, determine how easily one can stretch their limited resources.
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Unfortunately limiting casters to x spellpoints or x spell slots a day tends to just heighten the problems of the 15 minute workdayThe 15 minute work day doesn't exist in PFS play. It shouldn't exist in any proper game, not when it really matters.
So sandbox style games are not "proper" games then?
Considering one of the most popular PF APs is basically sandbox, PC driven exploration I don't think that the artificial "you need to get mcguffin x or princess y dies" is necessary or even desirable for many groups.
I realize that some people like their games to have some degree of urgency that limits the ability of casters to take advantage of crafting and divinations but seriously please stop assuming that your preferred play style is the only one possible or even the dominant playstyle.
Wizards/Clerics can be euphemisms for full arcane/divine Casters, as you like. Throw Druids on the heap.
That leaves you with partial casters at best.
A better term might be: If the wizard/cleric/druid SPELL LISTS were not a part of the game, how would it change?
Drop that bomb. You'd be left with some paladin and bard only spells, and that's about it. Paladins with lay on hands would now be your uber healers, because nobody else could heal. Partial caster classes just got neutered, and full caster classes naturally are almost useless. You'd play a cleric so you could CHANNEL...wouldn't that be strange?
All the things I mentioned become virtually impossible.
If, on the other hand, you remove Fighters, Fighter only feats, Theives, and Rogue Talents (which naturally include all the Ninja Talents), Heck, if you took away all the COMBAT FEATS...what would it do to the game?
Almost nothing. Barbs would use rage powers, which are better then combat feats. Rangers would lose a combat style, but it wouldn't bother them much..they'd spend their feats on general enhancement.
Seriously, spells make the huge difference in game play. It's narrative power, and how the story unfolds.
==Aelryinth
The Pathfinder Fighter has considerably more mobility in heavy armor over his 3.5 counterpart, once he develops armor training. Paladins can only match that by expenditure of a fairly high spell slot for them.You've failed to actually say why you think the game would suffer by giving the Fighter more options.
What harm is there giving the Fighter more mobility?
All of the martials suffer a problem with mobility really. Full attack or bust yo'.
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Heck, if you took away all the COMBAT FEATS...what would it do to the game?
Almost nothing.
This' some serious exaggeration, but other than that bit, I agree with Aelrynth.
The Pathfinder Fighter has considerably more mobility in heavy armor over his 3.5 counterpart, once he develops armor training. Paladins can only match that by expenditure of a fairly high spell slot for them.You've failed to actually say why you think the game would suffer by giving the Fighter more options.
What harm is there giving the Fighter more mobility?
He's still very much tied to 5' steps due to the iterative attack mechanic. In comparison the Barbarian (who will have rage) has a much more expansive area of control due to high mobility and the ability to full attack at the end of a move.
And don't even pull out Vital Strike as a remotely decent replacement because it's not. Even if you got the full chain for the cost of one feat it's still an inferior attack choice.
I made a build that could use the vital strike chain well...
But it involved /magic/ and 2 3rd party feats.
And being a ranger lv 4 or oracle lv 1.
So still useless to a fighter.
Honestly the entire Vital Strike as written should basically be a no feat combat option so that anyone can basically use it scaled to BAB whenever a full attack routine isn't viable. You still basically need to decide what to do with pounce-like abilities because they are dramatically better than any current feat option in the game and having that differential between martial classes is a massive problem.
Personally I would actually kinda like pounce to go away altogether (because it simply makes cats the uber companion, summons, animal shape, etc) and replace it with greater martial mobility.
I'm not completely sold on ditching iteratives, though. There are advantages in doing so due to ease of play and instead of rolling multiple attacks you can simply scale the damage to represent a combo attack but you still can run into some issues with gameplay due to the desirability of multiple attacks (thus giving advantages to pet based classes). This could be solved with just making the wolf damage be bonus damage but it's unsatisfying because it's gamist as hell.
Erm... Oracles and Sorcs are still full casters and very capable. I don't think that's really any different than what Aelrynith said.It doesn't change at all, in fact we have neither a cleric nor a Wizard. We have several oracles, bards and Sorcerers in my three games, but no Wizards or Clerics. We can Fly, T-port, Summon Monsters, Fireballs, etc. We have MORE healing as a Life oracle is a better healer than a cleric.How does the game change when you remove the wizard? The cleric?
It changes incredibly. Magic items define what unnatural stuff you can do. You can't fly. You can't teleport. You can't summon monsters. You can't toss fireballs, you can't change shape, you can't charm/dominate monsters. You don't have HEALING. You can't be returned video gamish from the dead. You can't buff/immunize yourself against special attacks. That's all now in the province of the enemy, and Craft Wondrous Item/Ring.What happens when you remove fighters and rogues?
Nothing. Alchemists and urban rangers can take care of the trapfinding. You can melee with summoned monsters or the right buffs. You can use different tactics and different spells to end the fighting. Your recovery options are still the same, you can still come back from death.
Did he not say that a urban ranger could handle the trapfinding if you removed rogue? Thus, a Sorc could handle the arcane casting if you removed the wizard. Same thing.
That (summons and pets, or action economy in general) is a separate issue entirely. I actually somewhat like the way 4e does it; you have to control your summon for it to act (with some summons acting on their own if not controlled but at highly reduced effectiveness or other drawbacks).
Yes, that's a much fairer way of doing it in a game so heavily built around the action economy.
This' some serious exaggeration, but other than that bit, I agree with Aelrynth.Heck, if you took away all the COMBAT FEATS...what would it do to the game?
Almost nothing.
Well, we wouldn't change them for MONSTERS, so they get to keep stuff.
The biggest thing that would change? No Power Attack/Deadly Aim. That would be pretty much the biggest change for PC characters. Weapon Finesse MIGHT get a nod for some classes.
But seriously, can you really think of any combat feats that have that huge and widespread an impact on combat? The two above are about it.
==Aelryinth
Heck, if you took away all the COMBAT FEATS...what would it do to the game?
Almost nothing.
But seriously, can you really think of any combat feats that have that huge and widespread an impact on combat? The two above are about it.
Can you think of any single spell that has that huge and widespread an impact on combat?
But you don't have 20 minutes. You have 5. And a search check takes at least a minute in and of itself. . . so no search, I assume you must be kicking down every door because picking a lock or searching for traps would eat up your minutes. . . whose doing this door kicking?
The Wizard?
Or are you only able to rush through because Barbarian is barreling through the doors for you?
So Wizard is broken because Barbarian can help him to get to all the encounters in a dungeon before his spells run out?
The main point was that 5 minutes is still more than enough.
Can you think of any single spell that has that huge and widespread an impact on combat?
i can think of several
Haste, that extra attack per round is a huge DPR boost on most martial characters that would benefit from it, and it's a big boost to martially oriented divine casters and partial casters too
Glitterdust. great for fighting invisible foes, as well as constructs with poor will saves and no immunity to blindness. most of the time, the construct isn't making the save without intervention from the dice gods
Summon Monster (Insert level appropriate Number here) an extra disposable ally designed to soak hits, reduce the need for healing, set off traps, and even fight back as an extra combatant. other than the long cast time and short duration, this spells effect, though brief, has quite a profound impact while it lasts, giving your tank time to heal for a bit
Planar Binding (the whole chain); being able to bind an outsider to help you out works wonders, whether an angel to both fight and heal along your side, or a succubus to help spread a positive reputation for you. outsiders are one of the best 3 creature types, comparable to fey and dragons. well, you can even bind native outsiders with class levels as long as their total hit dice doesn't exceed the limit of the spell.
Color Spray; useless past levels 4-5. effectively AoE save or die at the low levels.
Fear; against foes whom aren't immune and have poor will saves, you effectively took them out of the fight long enough to take out the more important foes
fly; this spell gives you flight, an ability that allows you to both avoid and initiate engagements with a variety of obstacles as you see fit. avoid many low level traps, avoid many melee only foes, and the spell allows you to set up all sorts of tactical advantages you normally wouldn't have. the only issue to this spell besides the duration, is the possibility of encountering a complex with a 15 foot or lower ceiling, a ceiling which fails to accomodate many creatures larger than medium size, and a poor choice of terrain on the part of many foes with a CR of 7 or higher, either due to their size, or due to the fact many of them possess flight.
stone shape, you can shape stone with a relatively moderate leveled spell. this spell, is useful for sieging castles, unless your DM includes fiated treatments against such a spell that aren't published.
Transmute Rock to Mud, this spell is also useful for sieging castles, unless your DM likes to use Fiated Affordable treatments against magic. the issue is, if a castle of that size is able to receive the whole treatment on every inch and crack, how cheap is this treatment? sounds pretty pricey, and sounds like it would be out of the budget for all but the richest of kings. in fact, what king still uses a castle? with magic, wouldn't an underground bunker make more sense?
Charm/Dominate Person/Monster; yay, you can take an enemy that was trying to kill you, make him a temporary ally, and have him kill his former buddies alongside you. if the guy doesn't die in battle before the spell wears off, you can simply choose not to heal him, and finish him off right there. the best foe to dominate is one whom sacrificed his will save to be a nasty killing machine, such as most archery fighters or even most giants.
Umbriere, you forgot healing spells. No healing magic = huge change in the way the game is played.
Ditto raise dead/resurrection, and the teleport/plane shifting spells, at higher level. Removal of them is a huge change in the way the game is played later, as well.
==Aelryinth
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Keep in mind that a lot of games are basically built around high stakes games of rocket tag. This was especially prevalent in high end 3.5 games. PF toned down some of the rocket tag aspects of the game but they are still there.
And the source of this information is? You have a survey that prove your affirmation?
The forum don't support it, all kind of plays is represented here, so probably it is your experience, but even if you have played for 40 years, it is your experience and that of your gaming group. Generally gaming groups tend to select a style of play and gravitate around it, so a single gaming group isn't really representative of the gaming world at large. It is its little word were people play stiles tend to conform to the group standard.Your gaming group play rocket tag, Anzyr group play rocket tag, Steve group don't play rocket tag, nor DrDeth group, nor mine, and so on.
Assuming that something is the best choice for all groups, all playstiles, all settings, all adventures is generalizing you play stile as the the only right playstile.
And the source of this information is? You have a survey that prove your affirmation?Keep in mind that a lot of games are basically built around high stakes games of rocket tag. This was especially prevalent in high end 3.5 games. PF toned down some of the rocket tag aspects of the game but they are still there.
The game tends to devolve into rocket tag. TV Tropes has a quick article on it. Its not just a playstyle, its just the way it tends to work for dnd.
Deadly Aim is power attack for archers, now. No need to be peevish, Diego. They are the same exact feat, with different names. You could have Power Attack apply to missile fire, and it wouldn't change the mechanics of things.
==Aelryinth
Umbriere, you forgot healing spells. No healing magic = huge change in the way the game is played.
Ditto raise dead/resurrection, and the teleport/plane shifting spells, at higher level. Removal of them is a huge change in the way the game is played later, as well.
==Aelryinth
i forgot to list those because i figured they were obvious
but yes, healing and condition removal spells, as well as transportation spells, do indeed, definitely change the way the game is played. Rope Trick does that too.
the only combat feats that i know of, that change the pace and/or outcome of combat in a similar way, are weapon finesse, deadly aim, power attack, piranha strike, and all the other power attack clones.
While not any single feat would have that much of an impact, removing all of them surely would.
But yeah, removing spells is much more of a game-changer.
the only combat feats that i know of, that change the pace and/or outcome of combat in a similar way, are weapon finesse, deadly aim, power attack, piranha strike, and all the other power attack clones.
Hit stuff harder isn't exactly changing the battlefield though. Some feats apply debuffs, sometimes en masse, and others can change the way your character works, but rarely will you see one that affects the world around you or is gamechanging.