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No, sorry. The spells for the paladin & ranger completely pale to the other partial casters.I tend to categorize the classes as follows:
Martial: barbarian, cavalier, fighter, gunslinger, monk, ninja, rogue, samurai
Partial Caster: alchemist, bard, inquisitor, magus, paladin, ranger, summoner
Caster: cleric, druid, oracle, sorcerer, witch, wizard
I personally did not arrange them to my opinion based on the strength of their magic (I agree they pale in comparison), but rather how much they have. 4th level spells is significantly more magic than other martials in my opinion.
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In one of the games I run we have (level 13/14):
Half Orc Barbarian
Human Wizard
Half-Drow Cleric
Elven Fighter
In the other we have (all level 3):
Human Fighter
Human Paladin
Dwarf Cleric
Human Witch
In one game I play in we have(levels 5-7):
Human Wizard
Half Orc Barbarian
Half Orc Barbarian
Human Rogue
In the other game I play in (Dragonlance updated to Pathfinder everyone level 2):
Human Wizard
Human Paladin
Minotaur Ranger
Minotaur Cleric
Now I have always firmly believed that casters are more powerful than martials once you get to higher levels (what level that happens at is still up for debate). This doesn't stop me from playing martials, partly because most games seem to stop after 6 or 8 levels (way before casters really overshine martials) and partly because I have ideas that I think are cool that involve martial characters sometimes.
Is it that martials are fun, or that vancian is a pain?
This has got to be one of the saddest statements I have heard in a long time.
You are actually trying to dismiss someone's fun by essentially stating they most likely play martials because they have trouble with the magic.
There are two fellow players in my group who have expressly stated that is why they don't play casters. Too complicated, too cumbersome, too annoying.
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There are two fellow players in my group who have expressly stated that is why they don't play casters. Too complicated, too cumbersome, too annoying.I've never seen a PFS game without either a fighter or barbarian, or at least one player with a few levels of fighter or barbarian. I agree that casters are more powerful, but players enjoy playing martials. I consider full BAB characters martials even if they have four levels of spells.Is it that martials are fun, or that vancian is a pain?This has got to be one of the saddest statements I have heard in a long time.
You are actually trying to dismiss someone's fun by essentially stating they most likely play martials because they have trouble with the magic.
The more responses I hear, the more I am convinced some of you don't actually play in a group.
FORMAT!
So two people you know match his description? Then it's a legit question if people like that exist.
So two people you know match his description? Then it's a legit question if people like that exist.
Aye, I know a few people who've been off-put by vancian style casting. Including myself, I like doing cool things, am not a fan of vancian, but a lot of the options are hidden in spells, and I really want to be a cool martial type of guy because I think wading through combat makes for something more exciting than archery or tactics from afar. Makes for a bit of a dilemma. If I do martial I'm usually a gish kind of guy.
Seems like the thread can't help but to devolve into its base element: a debate on whether casters dominate rather than whether groups with casters have martials/what they do with them.
Personally, I've never experienced an issue where casters dominate in any meaningful way. Irritate, yes.
If in the hands of the wrong sort of personality, it's not long before a wizard begins teleporting around every trap, or riddle, or whatever else the GM has in place to challenge the actual brains of the party. Which quickly becomes boring, not only for the GM, but oftentimes for the other players, as well.
I think, similarly to this, a caster can occasionally drop a bomb that takes care of what might have been an otherwise interesting encounter. I think that when the caster is lucky enough that this happens - and it does NOT always happen - it "confirms" for certain players something they wish were true, but is not true; that being that casters ALWAYS dominate.
Confirmation bias is a b@%**. Gamers seem to fall for it just as much as any other group.
You know what's more powerful than a group of caster? What is more powerful than a group of martials? The answer is a group of casters and martials working synergetically together.Unless you have a Druid or Summoner or Magus filling the Martial role.Beat me to it. The thing more powerful than a group of martials and casters working together is a group of casters working together.
Honestly, if casters were a little more powerful than martials but generally needed martials to complete adventures then this whole argument wouldn't matter.
The real problem is that plenty of casters can get to the point where they can basically solo most published adventures. There are so many ways for casters to get extra power or power beyond their level.
If the group that had both casters and martials had more synergy than other groups that would be good. To bad the greatest synergy is with a bunch of casters.
1. But do we play the game for to see how powerful our characters are or to have fun?
2.Yes, but that point is 17th level or so, and few games are played at that level.
3. Indeed, in our 13th level game, my Sorcerers main tactic is to boost the %$#@! out of the Fighter, and launch him like some sort of whirling death avatar at the bad guys. Works HWAAAAAY better than just me casting alone. HUGE synergy.
2.Yes, but that point is 17th level or so, and few games are played at that level.I'm not sure where this idea comes from.
Save-or-Lose spells are available right from level 1, and you're starting to access mission-breaking spells by your third or fourth spell level. Most discussions of tiers and raw power ignore anything past 15th level anyways because stuff breaks apart so much with 9th level spells are accessible.
Actually, even at level one you have charm person, silent image, feather fall, and grease. All powerful utility spells at level one, and capable of doing crazy things with the narrative or problem solving! And mount for trapfinding, and summon monster, though it won't be as powerful until it starts picking up outsiders with a variety of skills imo. Even at level one you have access to some crazy stuff. Level 2 is invisibility, and spider climb, etc, and you only get more options and quantity and quality of your old spells increases as you level.
Seems like the thread can't help but to devolve into its base element: a debate on whether casters dominate rather than whether groups with casters have martials/what they do with them.
Maybe. I've appreciated the comments so far anyhow, so perhaps it doesn't matter so much anymore. I was mainly trying to preempt revisiting the debate rather than reporting on party makeup.
Fwiw, I was curious since the caster-martial thing seems to provoke such passion on the forums and I wondered how those who feel strongly that there is a problem actually deal with it. I play with the same group I played with since the seventies and eighties, so my experience of playstyles and opinions about the game is ridiculously limited.
3. Indeed, in our 13th level game, my Sorcerers main tactic is to boost the %$#@! out of the Fighter, and launch him like some sort of whirling death avatar at the bad guys. Works HWAAAAAY better than just me casting alone. HUGE synergy.
It works better for you that way because you built for it. Likewise if you built to be more of a solo act you'd have similar results.
So while its all well and good that you want to be sure that your Fighter player is well used when you can achieve a similar effect without him if you wanted to, makes the discussion...difficult to say the very least.
Or you can encourage the non-casters to make partial casters. Bards/Rangers/Inquisitors/Paladins/Alchemists/Ninjas/Magi all work great. And if they take archetypes even monks can join in the fun.
Fwiw, I was curious since the caster-martial thing seems to provoke such passion on the forums and I wondered how those who feel strongly that there is a problem actually deal with it. I play with the same group I played with since the seventies and eighties, so my experience of playstyles and opinions about the game is ridiculously limited.
I didn't just play with martials at my table, I was a martial!
I formed my opinion about it by playing the game since 3.0 with various groups and with all sorts of classes. At one point I realized my ranger, paladin/fighter, swashbuckler and barbarian all played a lot alike because they all spammed full attack and it was really the center of their plan. Later on I tried things like wizard and warblade and saw the difference, and I did a lot of studying about game design. Of course I've played at a table with all sorts of players and classes.
And of course, the only class I've ever had a GM ask me to remake was a Rogue who took the Combat Trapsmith PRC back in 3.5. He relied on feats like Fade into Violence to make foes ignore him while he set up traps all over the battlefield. Was AC focused and thus very hard to hit. Remade him into a Druid with a crocodile animal companion. This oddly got no complaint from the GM. I guess high AC and being prevented from attacking my character were not the GMs favorite things.
Most groups I have seen tend to try sticking to the "four person band" model, unless they wish to try experimenting.
This means there is usually a cleric or druid divine mage, a martial of some sort (paladin, fighter, ranger), an arcane mage, and a skill monkey (rogue, or monk).
In the most recent group I run, there are two martials (fighter and paladin), two skill monkeys (monk and rogue), two clerics, and a bard (the closest to arcane mage).
I've also found that most groups would jump into any session of less than 10th level without an arcane mage, yet become very frightened and skittish if they have no martials or divine casters for that session.
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I tend to categorize the classes as follows:
Martial: barbarian, cavalier, fighter, gunslinger, monk, ninja, rogue, samurai
Partial Caster: alchemist, bard, inquisitor, magus, paladin, ranger, summoner
Caster: cleric, druid, oracle, sorcerer, witch, wizard
No, sorry. The spells for the paladin & ranger completely pale to the other partial casters.
I'd add summon to 'full caster", since he gets many spells early, but that's just my opinion.
Having spells at all is still very different from not having spells. I can see Ranger and Paladin as being considered in a different category than other martials pretty easily as even before they gain spellcasting they have options that are very different from their counterparts, and once they gain casting those options expand even further.
Agreed on Summoned though. The Summoned is not a partial caster. He is absolutely a full caster.
In the games I've played most characters are casters or half casters. In one game there's a cleric, sorcerer, wizard, Druid, fighter and soon to join the game bard. Lots of magic there. In the other game I'm in there is a ranger, monk, oracle, sorcerer and a 3.5 converted warlock. So that one leans a bit more on the martial side, but not much.
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If there's a rogue in your group, don't throw knock, invisbility and scrying around.
My Sorc cast invis *ON* the rogue.
On a tangent from Nicos -
High level play tends to be rare for me. Why? Because there's an undercurrent of several players that prefer to work up from first level to whenever.
Why? Usually because said players feel more emotional attachment if they can work their characters on an epic journey from low to high level rather than just start cold with a high level character - for whatever reason.
If players agree to start at 17+ level, then I would have more high level play. Some do, most do not.
So, for the groups that want to work from 1st level on up, you have the problems of RL that can stop the group from achieving the campaign to higher levels (TPK forces a campaign reset, group dissolves, group losses interest after a year of playing and stop at 10th level, etc.)
In short, unless your group wants to start at higher level, it becomes more difficult to reach high level play. In contrast, I tend to see most play occur from levels 1-10.
On a tangent from Nicos -
High level play tends to be rare for me. Why? Because there's an undercurrent of several players that prefer to work up from first level to whenever.
Why? Usually because said players feel more emotional attachment if they can work their characters on an epic journey from low to high level rather than just start cold with a high level character - for whatever reason.
If players agree to start at 17+ level, then I would have more high level play. Some do, most do not.
So, for the groups that want to work from 1st level on up, you have the problems of RL that can stop the group from achieving the campaign to higher levels (TPK forces a campaign reset, group dissolves, group losses interest after a year of playing and stop at 10th level, etc.)
In short, unless your group wants to start at higher level, it becomes more difficult to reach high level play. In contrast, I tend to see most play occur from levels 1-10.
Right, I agree. Sure, sometimes we start at 2nd level or something, but just stating out a new before played 17th level PC just feels wrong. And you tend to make mistakes.
But you are correct in that it just isn;t that easy to get to 17th level.
As as straight up answer:
I have not seen a player choose to bring a single classed fighter or rogue to my table outside of very young kids playing PFS at my FLGS. I have not seen an experienced player select those classes since I have started running Pathfinder. I have seen barbarians, rangers, and paladins. I have had a person want to play a cavalier with a 3rd party archtype so that instead of a mount they got a "guard wolf" and basically have a druids animal companion instead of a mount.
This is true for every starting level of play and known campaign lengths of from 1 session to over 2 years.
In older editions, someone had to play the cleric. Now someone has to play the martial class. No matter how many spells you have, you still need a blocker, a PC who does damage and takes it too. At my tables, in order for the casters to win glory, there has to be people in the trenches.
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In older editions, someone had to play the cleric. Now someone has to play the martial class. No matter how many spells you have, you still need a blocker, a PC who does damage and takes it too. At my tables, in order for the casters to win glory, there has to be people in the trenches.
Cleric, Druid and Oracle say "Hi". As does Dragon Disciple. And let's not forget half-casters, such as Inquisitor, Bard, Summoner and Magus.
In older editions, someone had to play the cleric. Now someone has to play the martial class. No matter how many spells you have, you still need a blocker, a PC who does damage and takes it too. At my tables, in order for the casters to win glory, there has to be people in the trenches.
Martials don't actually have the best defenses in the game in all circumstances though. Many have bad saves, hp is a lot closer than it was in older editions and bulks up at the roughly same rate(not a bad thing...), and spells can add a lot to defenses that a class wouldn't normally have such as concealment. resistance, or mirror images, and spells have the best escape tactics. Oh! and the best defense is one that's expendable imo, like a summon. I had a GM once that hated our summoner for using the eidolon as a tank because if he didn't bring you to -1 or below you must be cheating.
In older editions, someone had to play the cleric. Now someone has to play the martial class. No matter how many spells you have, you still need a blocker, a PC who does damage and takes it too. At my tables, in order for the casters to win glory, there has to be people in the trenches.
There is no such blocking or tanking mechanic in Pathfinder. And anyone can take and deal damage. And casters can summon meatshields that can also take and deal damage.
Edit: Additionally, everything MrSin said above.
Four post in a row to tell someone how to tank without martials in a different way. Glad we have options here.
I'll just add 3 Sneak Attacks to my Ninja Score.
I personally like the Octopus with Sky Swim cast on him. :)
I personally like the Octopus with Sky Swim cast on him. :)
I have seen enough anime to know where this is going...
Gotta admit. I walked right into that one... And with a smiling emoticom....
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Yeah, casters have a dozen ways to be effective frontliners. The idea of needing a non-caster frontline is pretty much dead. I think the most brokenly effective melee character I ever actually played was a Synthesist Summoner*...
On the actual topic:
I see Paladins, Rangers, and Barbarians all the time. And Gunslingers, Monks (all Qinggong and usually another archetype), and Cavaliers occasionally. Of course, two of those have casting, another two have fun supernatural or spell-like effects, and another attacks vs. touch AC.
Basically only Fighter and Rogue are inferior enough that I don't see them...and that has more to do with them than with casters.
But then, I'm not one of the really hardline people on the caster/martial disparity thing. I freely admit that full casters, done properly, are the most powerful thing in the game by leaps and bounds, certainly above martial characters...but the gap isn't so wide that the martial classes aren't effective or fun to play.
Honestly, personal system mastery seems to have a lot more to do with relative power and effectiveness than choice of class does. Now, my friend who optimizes most was scarier playing a Wizard or Oracle than an Antipaladin...but in all three cases his character was one of the most frightening in the group.
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*What? I'd never played the class before, didn't realize quite how broken it might be, and had a really good concept...
Doing my first mystic theurge, started tonight 3.5 level 2, healer/sorcerer since my group had no healing and no buffing capabilities :P
I've tried several times to make a mystic theurge and just cannot make one I enjoy in game.
I've tried several times to make a mystic theurge and just cannot make one I enjoy in game.
Have you tried the cleric 1/empyreal sorcerer 2/theurge x option? You lose a caster level on the sorcerer and two on the cleric, but... Well, at level 7 you're casting like a 6th level sorcerer and a 5th level cleric.
(Disclaimer: I think casters only become a problem if they are played a specific way (save-or-suck) or later in the game around the teen levels.)
We see fighters at our table as much as any other class. However, since we play with only 3 players and the GM, and are doing APs, we don't see that many different characters.
I think one of the main things people miss about full BAB characters in the casters vs. martials discussion is that martials+casters is often more powerful then casters. Often it takes a little time to get that cleric buffed up for combat, or get those summons out. The fighter is what allows the casters time to do their thing. There are also many combos where the fighter plays a part - for example the hold spell-coup de grace.
I think one of the main things people miss about full BAB characters in the casters vs. martials discussion is that martials+casters is often more powerful then casters. Often it takes a little time to get that cleric buffed up for combat, or get those summons out. The fighter is what allows the casters time to do their thing. There are also many combos where the fighter plays a part - for example the hold spell-coup de grace.
Well, anyone can CDG, and a lot of buffs should be cast before you enter combat. Other martials than a fighter can help hold the front if you do need that time, and to be honest a fighter might devour another turn asking for a buff(and resources) he can't make himself.
CDG after hold person isn't really a role. Its like playing janitor, and anyone can do it.
(Disclaimer: I think casters only become a problem if they are played a specific way (save-or-suck) or later in the game around the teen levels.)
We see fighters at our table as much as any other class. However, since we play with only 3 players and the GM, and are doing APs, we don't see that many different characters.
I think one of the main things people miss about full BAB characters in the casters vs. martials discussion is that martials+casters is often more powerful then casters. Often it takes a little time to get that cleric buffed up for combat, or get those summons out. The fighter is what allows the casters time to do their thing. There are also many combos where the fighter plays a part - for example the hold spell-coup de grace.
Except that is not quite the case. The problem many people are having is that they are comparing Wizard vs Wizard+Fighter. Or, in the case of the rogue, try to force the wizard to fill both his own role and the rogue of the party when the correct thing would be to have a whole seperate caster filling only the rogue slot.
A party of casters would actually end up significantly more powerful than otherwise. For instance:
Replace FULL BAB MARTIAL DUDE with:
Synthesist Summoner
Master Summoner
Druid Wildshaper
Cleric
Oracle of Battle/Metal
Bard
Inquisitor
Warpriest
Beastmorph Vivisectionist Alchemist
if you are playing with Mythic Tiers, Ravingdork has a Pure Wizard Transmuter that can put martials to shame.
I mean all of these guys can do everything a FULL BAB guy does, but also have a HUGE assortment of spells at their disposal...