I never really understood how spells being able to do things was a martial issue.
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DrDeth -- all good examples, and they all tie into my second point. A tank was more viable in 1e/2e because of the way initiative and tactical movement worked; they no longer work that way. Wizards couldn't casually end combats because saves scaled and DCs/target rolls didn't. A thief was needed because traps killed you, dead, and only a thief could find them. All of these are areas in which the rules of previous editions naturally led to balanced interdependent teams far better, in my opinion, than the current ones do.True, but the problem arises when no one wants to play the thief.... now your stuck and someone needs to sacrifice their fun so that you can run through a dungeon. 1e/2e also created the idea of "we need a healer." but what happens when no one wants to be the party bandage and sit around just going " i guess Ill cast cure light wounds... yay.."
Well, people usually lined up to play the Thief, the class was that cool (if I say so myself <g>). And clerics usually wumped foes in combat with a mace, doing only emergency healing during battle. True, their spell selections usually went CLW, CLW, CLW, CLW, Bless- oh yes and CLW. ;-)
True the game was designed around a TEAM, with cleric, wizard, thief & warrior type. But what happens today if no one wants to play shortstop? Or everyone wants to play the battleship token in Monopoly? You compromise, and everyone still has fun.
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But Barclay was a great all-around player.
Barkley.
The Barclays Center is where the Brooklyn Nets play.
We should focus on attempting to
1.) Identify disparities in actual blue-water games. This isn't hard science, so anecdotes supporting both sides from either camp are more helpful here then 'well, this spell is broken, so they win' 'nuh uh, we've got anti-spell + infinity' style discussions.
2.) Attempt to determine where potential disparities from people's anecdotal experiences may arise from (OP's 1e style, my 2e style, Kirth's system mastery, the color of the moon nearby, players viewing the system differently, the cost of tea in china, inverse relationship to Drizzt books published, etc.)
3.) Not act as if 'casters are op' or 'casters are not op' is an intrinsic axiom to this conversation. That's I feel is a different debate (I might be wrong). In this case, its a question of why does a player's perceived experiences at table, differ so considerably from what the forums seem to indicate should be the expected.
Completely on board here. Here are some examples that sit strongly in my mind from games i've played recently.
1. This was from a converted 3.5 published adventure who's name I dont remember. We were in a cave complex controled by a group of gnolls. We came around a corner to a very long straight stretch of cave (200 feet by 30 feet if I remember). At the end of that stretch of cave was a 15ft wall with a gate, and bow armed gnolls defending it. The gate was apparently effectively immovable without activating a lever on the far side of the wall. The party consisted of my wayang witch, a human wizard, badass barbarian with a reach weapon, and a human two weapon fighting rogue. All 6th level.
What happened was pretty solidly demonstrative of narrative power of magic in game. The wizard went next, cast haste. The cast glitterdust catching all 5 gnolls in the area and blinding 3 of the 5. They both moved 60 feet closer to the enemies.
2 major changes to the situation happened. First off, at least for a time, there were half as many enemies involved in the fight. The gnolls apparently didnt have very good saves, so the blinded ones were out of commision for several rounds. And once she got in range, the rogue was able to sneak attack the blinded gnolls, something that wouldnt have been possible in the situation as it was presented. The second was it would take only a single round for the martial characters (or indeed anyone) to get to the wall. Without haste it would have taken 2 rounds, where the barbarian would not have been able to attack, and the rogue might have been able to shoot, but wouldnt have been sneak attacking.
The barbarian then moved up but didnt run, staying within close range of the witch, the rogue ran up to get into sneak attack range. The 2 gnolls shot arrows
The wizard dropped 2 (1 of the unblindgnolls) in a pit. The witch began casting enlarge person on the barbarian. The barbarian delayed (effectively refocusing his turn to wait for the witch to finish). The rogue shot one of the blinded gnolls, injuring it significantly.
The single gnole shot back at the party. At this point the wizard I believe decided to just take a pot shot with his crossbow, feeling his work was done. The witch finished casting enlarge person and activated his fly hex, beggining to fly higher in the cavern and taking cover behind some stalagtites.
The barbarian, now enlarged with a reach weapon was able to attack the gnolls at the top of the 15ft wall without having to try and make a dc 20 climb check (the apparent difficulty of climbing the wall). The rogue was still able to sneak attack blinded gnolls. At this point, 1 gnoll besides the two in the pit were still alive.
On the following turn, the witch flew over the wall, and pulled the lever to open the gate and the party went in, and finished off the remaining gnolls relatively easily.
Mind you, everyone in this encounter had fun (though the dm was a bit annoyed that it was easier then he expected). The barbarian got to smash stuff, the rogue shot a guy in the kidney (sneak attack). But the encounter would have been very very different without the casters. Their contribution was disproportionate to that of the barbarian and rogue. The rogue and barbarian contributed, and were essential to success. But without the casters the encounter would have been dramatically more difficult.
Without haste it would have been at least 2 turns getting shot at before the party was able to respond, more if our 20ft movement heavy armor paladin had been present that day. Without glitterdust and creat pit alot more enemies would have been attacking the party at once, and without enlarge person the barbarian wouldnt have been able to attack back as effectively, and would have had to try and climb the wall with enemies shooting him. Where as the witch simply flew over the wall with his fly hex and opened the gate.
Haste, glitterdust, create pit, enlarge person, and fly didnt just overcome the challenge, they changed the nature of it. None of the rogue or barbarians abilities could have provided the same kind of turn in the tides of battle. They could only take advantage of what the casters provided them.
So you tell me, is there an issue here? For me its the disporportionate contribution to success, and the fact that the casters have far more control over the situation as a whole then the martial characters do. What are your thoughts on this situaton?
It's not quite the same thing. Probably all the player have seen a wizard in their party, so they did ''use the simulacrum'' before. And even then, they (we) didn't saw any problem, or at least not enough problem to change the class. So, is it surprising that we don't really see the good point of changing the class? No, not really.
They used it in a way that didn't lead to problems. We change the rules to reflect the way they used it. i.e., the fixes can be simply hard-coding non-disruptive ways of playing into the rules. You don't have to "change the class," just make it work the way people who don't have problems use it.
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But Barclay was a great all-around player.Barkley. The Barclays Center is where the Brooklyn Nets play.
Right you are, and I'm ashamed of myself for the misspelling. Thanks!
The problem is, you’ll only ever get people who run into the same problems to join you on your quest for fixes. You can try to convince others that any particular factor is a problem, but if they never actually experience it then there's really no reason for them to get behind you.Sure, but there's really no particular reason for them to oppose it, either. For example, if you never have a problem with simulacrum because you never actually use it, why should you be so up in arms against the spell being revised to prevent abuse?
In a lot of cases, I advocate changes that the people who don't see the problem would never even notice. Things like assigning a maximum total CR to summoned allies or controlled undead, for example. Or not allowing teleportation and scrying into castles and dungeons, by ruling that X thickness of stone blocks those effects. Those changes could improve play immeasureably for the people with issues, and not affect people without them at all.
But if I advocate them, I'm badwrongfun and must be stopped at all costs!
I know you spend a decent amount of time on the Paizo forums. What happens when the Paizo Dev team releases a new rules fix?
I don't think anyone asking for rules fixes is doing anything wrong, but all too often rules "fixes" become broken rules that now need to be reevaluated by everyone.
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We should focus on attempting to
1.) Identify disparities in actual blue-water games. This isn't hard science, so anecdotes supporting both sides from either camp are more helpful here then 'well, this spell is broken, so they win' 'nuh uh, we've got anti-spell + infinity' style discussions.
2.) Attempt to determine where potential disparities from people's anecdotal experiences may arise from (OP's 1e style, my 2e style, Kirth's system mastery, the color of the moon nearby, players viewing the system differently, the cost of tea in china, inverse relationship to Drizzt books published, etc.)
3.) Not act as if 'casters are op' or 'casters are not op' is an intrinsic axiom to this conversation. That's I feel is a different debate (I might be wrong). In this case, its a question of why does a player's perceived experiences at table, differ so considerably from what the forums seem to indicate should be the expected.
Good points. Allow me to offer my recent examples.
Our RoW game had the first two examples I mentioned. I've used Acute Senses for this before in a Carrion Crown game too, so successfully so that the GM of both these games is considering slashing the effectiveness of that spell in half. Our Carrion Crown game also had the alchemist (played by me) using the Infusion discovery along with Delayed Consumption to provide the entire party with time-delayed (essentially on-demand) infusions of Death Ward or Freedom of Movement, which he setup ahead of time. We used Dispel effects to close a wormhole to deep space a cultist of Dagon had opened using Miracle to try and kill a small town with, us included. There's more, like our ability in RoW to walk over an entire dragon-kin army using Communal Air Walk, cutting down the number of fights involved from who knows how many to just 3 quick and easy ones. Also, we're currently looking at helping the fort defenders we went to assist with Guards and Wards covering the entire north half of the fort. Oh yeah, and Mythic Endure Elements has meant that, almost since day one in this campaign, cold weather hasn't affected our movement or sight at all. Did I mention the party witch used her Healing and Major Healing hexes to pretty much patch up the ENTIRE DEFENDING ARMY? Because she did, because you can use each of those once a day per person, so why not. Until he forgot to recast it once while fighting a boss and then got spectacularly unlucky on defense, our arcane duelist bard was using Mirror Image almost every single fight and, therefore, was much less of a healing sink than almost anyone else in the party unless the enemy mobbed him. We'll have access to Heal soon, too, so curing the insanity of a couple NPCs hiding in our traveling, plot-provided demi-plane so they don't try and murder us will be possible.
None of this is possible using mundane methods. It simply can't be done by the rules and content in Pathfinder as is, unlike the Infusion + Delayed Consumption trick I mentioned above. If that isn't an example of magic vs non-magic disparity in PC capability, I'm not sure what is. Keep in mind, we run with a 'buff slot limit' house-rule in our games as well. You can have no more than 4 + one-fifth your level in buff spells on you, such as Good Hope or Remove Fear. We allow 2 free ones if you cast them on yourself and things lasting less than 2 rounds or 24+ hours by default don't count. Hasn't stopped the shenanigans yet, but it has kept player power inflation via magic and consumables to reasonable levels.
Oh, and I should mention this last thing: as part of our previous weekend game, we had a homebrew campaign that we ran two high level modules in, tweaking a couple things for story purposes in both. Those two were The Witchwar Legacy and The Moonscar. Both of these modules assume, based on their high level, that the spellcasters in their party will just find a way to get past certain obstacles. No joke, they essentially state "Magic will help here, let your players figure it out for you". That's either fantastically lazy on the part of the writers or indicative of the kind of incredible power and versatility that high-level spellcasters can have. Needless to say, we had such casters, so it worked out.
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Well, people usually lined up to play the Thief, the class was that cool (if I say so myself <g>).
And modest, too!
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Do Fighters need to have Fly and Teleport and Create Demiplane? Do we need to delete those spells? Or can the TEAM get along just fine with one member being able to do those things instead of everyone? With, say the fighter being the guy who loves dealing massive damage in combat but isn't interested so much otherwise? With the guy who plays the face loving those roleplaying encounters? Etc.At some point the fighter needs to be able to fly, and eventually he'll need some means to bypass lengthy travel. If one person does all that for him, then that person is playing that part of the game, and the fighter isn't. That's maybe fair if, when you finally enter combat, the caster has no offensive capabilities whatsoever -- but when the caster can fight, too, now you have a situation in which only casters can deal with terrain, but anyone can deal with combat. This starts to happen well before 17th level.
Now, if we give the fighter the option to pick up a flying steed, and let it scale with his level like an animal companion so it doesn't die in every encounter, now he can fly -- but we didn't give him a fly spell. If we give him "army buddies" on another continent who can conduct operations on his behalf while he's somewhere else, we eliminate the need for him to be able to teleport. And so on. And, because spells are hard-written into the rules, so these options might be, instead of relying on DM generosity.
Fun fact, this exists, and people hate it. Its called leadership. And there was a time when it or something like it was an assumed part of the game. But gms for some reason chafe harder when the fighter and rogue get narrative control without gm permission then when the wizard and cleric get it.
I firmly believe a rogue SHOULD get a theives guild as a part of leveling up. Not to follow him around, but to gather information, perform simple tasks, find things, kill people he wants dead, intimidate people he wants intimidated, stuff like that. Same with the fighter, but an army instead of theives guild.
I know you spend a decent amount of time on the Paizo forums. What happens when the Paizo Dev team releases a new rules fix?The problem is, you’ll only ever get people who run into the same problems to join you on your quest for fixes. You can try to convince others that any particular factor is a problem, but if they never actually experience it then there's really no reason for them to get behind you.Sure, but there's really no particular reason for them to oppose it, either. For example, if you never have a problem with simulacrum because you never actually use it, why should you be so up in arms against the spell being revised to prevent abuse?
In a lot of cases, I advocate changes that the people who don't see the problem would never even notice. Things like assigning a maximum total CR to summoned allies or controlled undead, for example. Or not allowing teleportation and scrying into castles and dungeons, by ruling that X thickness of stone blocks those effects. Those changes could improve play immeasureably for the people with issues, and not affect people without them at all.
But if I advocate them, I'm badwrongfun and must be stopped at all costs!
Sometimes nothing much at all. Sometimes it actually makes the ability work properly without having the GM have to make up stats for something he shouldn't have to, like the witch hexes issue from early this year. Sometimes something cool like Crane Wing gets gutted to oblivion. And sometimes they revert these ridiculous nerfs, but not always. *fingers crossed for Crane Wing*.
Oh, and I should mention this last thing: as part of our previous weekend game, we had a homebrew campaign that we ran two high level modules in, tweaking a couple things for story purposes in both. Those two were The Witchwar Legacy and The Moonscar. Both of these modules assume, based on their high level, that the spellcasters in their party will just find a way to get past certain obstacles. No joke, they essentially state "Magic will help here, let your players figure it out for you". That's either fantastically lazy on the part of the writers or indicative of the kind of incredible power and versatility that high-level spellcasters can have. Needless to say, we had such casters, so it worked out.Can you elaborate on this?, what if the group have no full specllcaster?
My guess? Prepare for pain.
I think the "casters vs martials" disparity all hinges on one very key assumption: the characters are over level 12, and are preferably 15.
Casters (and for realzies, I'm talking about Wizards and Sorcerers here- Clerics/Oracles/Witches/Druids have other abilities) are nice to have along from 5-8 and really nice to have from 9-12... but other players don't really feel like tag-alongs at those levels. You can build caster characters that noticeably dominate most encounters, but you can also build martial characters that noticeably dominate most encounters. When things get to that point, it's a player problem instead of a system problem.
There's a reason that GM's aren't flooded with parties full of level 1 Wizards. (Beyond that fact that repeatedly playing one class would be boring, that is.) 1st and 2nd level spells aren't strong enough... and casters don't get enough of them at low levels... to win the day on their own. Sure, color spray is great. Color Spray can easily one-shot encounters. But speaking as someone who has played the color spraying oracle of heavens/sorcerer, color spray can't dominate everything. It's a powerful and useful tool in many situations, but there were very few encounters that my sorcerer/oracle could solo. Without martials in the party, most enemies would have been stunned and gotten right back up before my character could finish his CdG attacks.
Another point that usually doesn't get made is that much of the strength of the caster assumes there are martials in the party. Haste ceases to be a strongly valuable spell if there isn't a martial to buff. Battlefield control spells can redirect the flow of traffic in a battle, but lose punch if there are no damage dealers to pick away at a divided enemy or stand in a choke point. Casters are often powerful because their spells have strong synergy with martials.
Of course, all of the above assumes a caster between levels 1 and 12. After that, the game changes and casters own. It also primarily assumes a wizard/sorcerer as the caster, and fails to account for the fact that hexes, wildshaping, revelations, and channeling can be useful (or rediculously powerful) independent of spells.
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I'll share my in-play experiences of why Spellcasters=Win.
1:So, we were playing at a higher-level[and in PFS], and we were told what we needed to do. Without spoilers, it was go somewhere far away, do a bit of cleaning up, and if you can, come back alive. The wizard has shadow-walk prepared. We went to both of the locations, jumped in, and "cleaned up" everyone trivially. To be clear, this wizard was not "Schrodinger's Wizard", he was a well-built one who was played by someone who knew how to take advantage of prepared spellcasting. Were the wizard not there, we would have been fatigued, had much more challenging fights, had to go through the doors, and wouldn't have caught people off-guard. We also, from my understanding, would have died very very hard 7 times over 6 ways from Sunday.
2:Another higher-level PFS game, it was a party of all martial characters[specifically, 3 sword-n-board characters and a roguish character]. We went through, after each fight we needed serious healing we didn't have the resources for, we spent a long time in the fights[minutes in-game], and had serious trouble. We got to the final boss, who was prepared, and were it not for the fact that the GM realized 1/2 through the fight that we were a lower level then he thought, we would have died. Had we had just 1 cleric, wizard, sorcerer, oracle, druid, witch, or summoner in the party, we wouldn't have been challenged by it nearly as much, and probably would have walked through the first 2-3 fights. Not "Schrodinger's" spellcaster either, only a moderately well-built one. So, not exactly "Spellcasters=Win", more "No spellcasters=lose".
Also, a bit of a clarification here:For those who don't know, PFS uses its own subset of houserules, which include banning a bunch of "OP" spells and archetypes and other options, and disallowing spellcasting. One of those houserules is that PFS GMs have to run modules as they are written. They can't modify the BBEG's tactics/stat block, they can't adapt to handle player tactics, and they can't really go very far off the tracks. There is a little bit of flexibility built into the thing, but not much. So, this example serves double a demonstration of the problem in the rules, and one in play.
Ever try using a fighter's mechanics to get across a continent? A rogue's mechanics to assault another plane? A barbarian's mechanics to get to the flying fortress? A cavalier's mechanics to discover what the bbeg is scheming? Sure, as DM you can give all that to your pcs, but if one is a wizard he doesn't need you to spoon feed him, he can solve all of the above based entirely upon the mechanics of his class.
I don't really see the point of this. If this were true, everyone would only play wizards. Maybe people actually enjoy playing someone who wears armor and has super strength?
Are you suggesting that we add teleporting, plane-shifting and mindreading to martial classes? What is so wrong with each class gets its own niche? So what if the wizard can fill more niches than the fighter can. No one who rolls a fighter has ever expected to open up portals to the plane of shadow.No wizard will ever be as good at fighting as the fighter. At best, the wizard can emulate a fighter's skills for a short period of time.
This discussion is so polarizing. Its like discussing politics or religion. You have one side who can't imagine how anyone could disagree that every class except wizards, clerics and druids is trash, and you have the other side that sees some issues and....deals with it. A good GM and good players simply don't let this problem ruin their games.
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What ya said, Mystically.
I've run dozens of parties. Players don't all go caster. I've even had a party missing arcane casters before. In PFS games, I seem to get a good variation. A good reason why is that, in lower levels, they aren't that pwnsome. The pay off for this, IMHO, is that if a caster DOES reach higher levels, they tend to outshine other classes.
This was really the case in older editions. Low level casters were really near - useless... and high level casters were demigods. Pathfinder gives low levels more toys to play with than D&D 1st, and because martials are much tougher and the such, Wizards feel just little less OP'd at high levels than the old days.
It's hard to really determine true 'balance' with so many moving pieces in a game as deep as PF. But, I do believe that good anecdotal evidence includes things like player preference. I've had high percentages of players go for builds like Zen Archer, certain summoner archtypes, etc...(which I've outlawed or nurfed in my home games) but I really don't get as many arcane casters as you would think if they were so overpowered.
I also agree with someone else's earlier post... a lot of what the wizard does makes others shine...since their true strength is in things like crowd control, buffs, etc. Color Spraying half of the opponents means little if you don't have some good martial characters on the team to take advantage of the enemies short term plight. Back in the old days, when they were more blasty, it felt more like they stole spotlights.
I will never disagree though, that they are certainly a class that completely shines if you play the class well.
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Are you suggesting that we add teleporting, plane-shifting and mindreading to martial classes?
Do you read any of what's in a thread before posting? For example:
Now, if we give the fighter the option to pick up a flying steed, and let it scale with his level like an animal companion so it doesn't die in every encounter, now he can fly -- but we didn't give him a fly spell. If we give him "army buddies" on another continent who can conduct operations on his behalf while he's somewhere else, we eliminate the need for him to be able to teleport.
Or
In a lot of cases, I advocate changes that the people who don't see the problem would never even notice. Things like assigning a maximum total CR to summoned allies or controlled undead, for example. Or not allowing teleportation and scrying into castles and dungeons, by ruling that X thickness of stone blocks those effects. Those changes could improve play immeasureably for the people with issues, and not affect people without them at all.
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A good GM and good players simply don't let this problem ruin their games.And yet again:
Yes, a good DM or casters playing with kid gloves can easily fix everything, but that's not the point. The point is that you're having to work against the system in order to get the system to work, which, to me, is less than ideal.
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People keep using Schrodinger's wizard in their attempt to prove casters are overpowered.People keep bringing up actual game play to show how casters can be overpowered, and even post links. Then other people screw their eyes shut, ignore all that, and go back to claiming it's all Schroedinger theorycraft. Hmmmmm.
My experience with actual game play is the exact opposite. I have only ever seen overpowered wizards while theory crafting. In practice, I have never seen a wizard show up with the exact spells needed or have their opponents fail all their saving throws.
[In a lot of cases, I advocate changes that the people who don't see the problem would never even notice. Things like assigning a maximum total CR to summoned allies or controlled undead, for example. Or not allowing teleportation and scrying into castles and dungeons, by ruling that X thickness of stone blocks those effects. Those changes could improve play immeasureably for the people with issues, and not affect people without them at all.
Except that pretty much neutered the divinitation school...
The problem with diviniation in hands of players is that it is either really crappy or really good... depending on the GM..
Except that pretty much neutered the divinitation school...
Only if the only divination you use is scrying. I've gotten a lot more mileage out of some of the other ones like legend lore and discern location and find the path.
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My solution to this whole issue is to put the danger back into spell casting. Teleport into a wall? Bam dead! Cast wish for anything loophole screw you hard. Cast a spell and fail possibility of the magic hurting you, fly gets dispelled?? You fall like a rock and go splat.
Paizo babies spell casters now, and that shouldn't be the case.
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My experience with actual game play is the exact opposite.
And, interestingly, BOTH experiences are real ones. From which we could conclude:
(a) Only the people seeing the problem are right, and everyone else is lying. But I don't think you're lying, so I move that we eliminate option "a."
OR
(b) Only the people not seeing the problem are right, and everyone else is theorycrafting. Except that we're speaking from play experience, and posting links, and so on, so we know this option isn't correct, either.
OR
(c) Some people have a problem and others don't experience it.
So, out of 3 possibilities, two are wrong. We look at the third one. It suggests that some people are doing something that prevents the problem, or else are refraining from doing other things, that lead to the problem. Things that we might, you know, write into the rules and disseminate to everyone, instead of keeping them a secret.
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I've done a lot of PFS... where we basically have to run things by the rules. We don't get the luxury of fiat'ing encounters or the such to make the non-wizard characters feel better about themselves. And players know that.
And many, in PFS, just make what, in their mind, is the most powerful build they can find. It seemed to me that nearly half of the players focused a lot of optimization and squeezing every last bit of combat effectiveness out of their builds. They wanted to dominate.
Yet, I didn't see all that many pure arcane casters/builds. And, I even saw more than a few martial builds.
I won't argue whether or not wizards/arcane casters are the key MVP in or out of battle more often than martials. I think you can make a solid case either way. But, in PFS, where players don't really get to have long discussions at all about party balance (you basically show up with your character and go for it), I rarely had two arcane casters. I often had none! So... while they may more powerful or dominating (especially when played well), I just don't see a swath of people flocking to them. :/
Even in homebrews, where party members discuss roles and balance, ya just don't see a lot of times where two players but heads over who gets to fill that arcane role. I couldn't tell you why, but its often harder to fill than the cleric/healer role nowadays. So, if they get to be OP'd in some battles where they prep properly and know what tools to use and when to use them...well, that's OK :)
I think the "casters vs martials" disparity all hinges on one very key assumption: the characters are over level 12, and are preferably 15.
In the Reign of Winter game I'm a part of, we're not even level 12 yet. Granted, this is a mythic game, but while for the ranger this just means move + full attack 90% of the time, our casters (witch / oracle / bard / inquisitor) are using their mythic power for free spells they don't even have to know or have memorized at higher caster levels. I should also note that the mythic element has nothing to do with the bits concerning Acute Senses, scaling the side of the 3-mile high mountain, walking 1000' over an entire army, healing another whole army in just an hour, and being an uber-tank using a simple level 2 spell. Granted, we can power-game some on occasion, but that's not what these are examples of.
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Are you suggesting that we add teleporting, plane-shifting and mindreading to martial classes?If only there were ways for high level martial characters to pick up these abilities.....
But we always seem to assume high level characters are standing around naked with zero resources.
Actually, most people just assume characters will have the same WBL, since the WBL guidelines don't discriminate between classes.
So, if a Wizard has a thousand more resources than a Fighter, then a Wizard + WBL will have a thousand more resources than a Fighter + WBL, making the whole point moot.
Nevermind the fact that casters have a much easier access to magic item crafting feats and some of them don't even need to buy armor or weapons, saving them a lot of money.
Are you suggesting that we add teleporting, plane-shifting and mindreading to martial classes?If only there were ways for high level martial characters to pick up these abilities.....
But we always seem to assume high level characters are standing around naked with zero resources.
Actually, most people just assume characters will have the same WBL, since the WBL guidelines don't discriminate between classes.
So, if a Wizard has a thousand more resources than a Fighter, then a Wizard + WBL will have a thousand more resources than a Fighter + WBL, making the whole point moot.
Nevermind the fact that casters have a much easier access to magic item crafting feats and some of them don't even need to buy armor or weapons, saving them a lot of money.
And lets not forget that Wizards are not having to dump a lot of money into items to cover up their weaknesses like just about every fighter that is ever posted in teh "fighter vs caster" threads...
I think the "casters vs martials" disparity all hinges on one very key assumption: the characters are over level 12, and are preferably 15.
Casters (and for realzies, I'm talking about Wizards and Sorcerers here- Clerics/Oracles/Witches/Druids have other abilities) are nice to have along from 5-8 and really nice to have from 9-12... but other players don't really feel like tag-alongs at those levels. You can build caster characters that noticeably dominate most encounters, but you can also build martial characters that noticeably dominate most encounters. When things get to that point, it's a player problem instead of a system problem.
There's a reason that GM's aren't flooded with parties full of level 1 Wizards. (Beyond that fact that repeatedly playing one class would be boring, that is.) 1st and 2nd level spells aren't strong enough... and casters don't get enough of them at low levels... to win the day on their own. Sure, color spray is great. Color Spray can easily one-shot encounters. But speaking as someone who has played the color spraying oracle of heavens/sorcerer, color spray can't dominate everything. It's a powerful and useful tool in many situations, but there were very few encounters that my sorcerer/oracle could solo. Without martials in the party, most enemies would have been stunned and gotten right back up before my character could finish his CdG attacks.
Another point that usually doesn't get made is that much of the strength of the caster assumes there are martials in the party. Haste ceases to be a strongly valuable spell if there isn't a martial to buff. Battlefield control spells can redirect the flow of traffic in a battle, but lose punch if there are no damage dealers to pick away at a divided enemy or stand in a choke point. Casters are often powerful because their spells have strong synergy with martials.
I agree, to an extent. In my 3.5 games, no doubt spellcasters could "win" and martials were superfluous once 9th level spells could be cast. But so far, in our games, this has not been a issue.
Our highest level game is only 13th, true. But there, like you said, "Casters are often powerful because their spells have strong synergy with martials." My sorc boosts our Fighter, turning him into a one man unstoppable engine of tanking destruction. GMW, Fly, and Haste are all it takes, and not always fly. So BAM! One boost (we have a bard also, who also boosts, of course) and "one man unstoppable engine of tanking destruction". Battlefield control spells keep hordes of monsters concentrated on the tank- not me.
Some have derided this TEAMwork as saying my Sorc is "carrying" the Fighter, but the Fighter also keeps nastys from eating my face, so it is TEAMwork.
So, I have no doubt it happens. I have seen it in 3.5, but only at levels 17+.
I do want to ask again- who here actually has a serious problem in caster/martial disparity in the games they run at levels under 17? Not theoretical, not one time sitreps where you caster did a "win"- I mean so much so that casters completely rule and martials arent having fun?
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My solution to this whole issue is to put the danger back into spell casting. Teleport into a wall? Bam dead! Cast wish for anything loophole screw you hard. Cast a spell and fail possibility of the magic hurting you, fly gets dispelled?? You fall like a rock and go splat.
Paizo babies spell casters now, and that shouldn't be the case.
So if you have 2 people looking to play video games, but you only have an xbox one and an atari. What you would do is let one person play the atari, and the other one play the xbox, but every 20 minutes come in and punch the one playing the xbox in the face to even things out? Thats your solution?
Punishing someone for doing their thing doesnt balance the effects of the abilities. It just makes it less fun for the person some of the time.
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I do want to ask again- who here actually has a serious problem in caster/martial disparity in the games they run at levels under 17? Not theoretical, not one time sitreps where you caster did a "win"- I mean so much so that casters completely rule and martials arent having fun?
In 3.5, we used to pretty reliably hit that point by about 11th level unless we took it easy on casting and also gave martials a bunch of stuff that's now locked into feat chains, in which case we could stretch it to maybe 13th. In Pathfinder, we found it to be dismayingly true at about 10th.
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So, if a Wizard has a thousand more resources than a Fighter, then a Wizard + WBL will have a thousand more resources than a Fighter + WBL, making the whole point moot.
WBL does entirely different things for martials and casters.
Martials gain abilities they otherwise would not have.
Casters extend the use of abilities already possessed, allowing for a longer adventuring day.
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WBL does entirely different things for martials and casters. Martials gain abilities they otherwise would not have. Casters extend the use of abilities already possessed, allowing for a longer adventuring day.
Martials can't do much except hit things with a stick, so, yes, anything else adds abilities. Casters have spells to do pretty much everything, so yeah, it's hard to add to that.
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And lets not forget that Wizards are not having to dump a lot of money into items to cover up their weaknesses like just about every fighter that is ever posted in teh "fighter vs caster" threads...
Looks at wizards character sheet ...... Umm!!!!
Sure; my casters never spend money on stats, saving throws, AC, or ioun stones with nifty abilities.
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Are you suggesting that we add teleporting, plane-shifting and mindreading to martial classes?If only there were ways for high level martial characters to pick up these abilities.....
But we always seem to assume high level characters are standing around naked with zero resources.
I don't remember seeing 3/day use magic items for fighters to suddenly gain the Spring Attack feat chain for free. That's what metamagic rods do. Likewise, I don't think there's anything a monk can use to suddenly acquire and use Quinggong ki powers. That's what staves let a caster do. To my knowledge, rogues can't use magic items that refresh their daily uses of rogue powers. Y'know, like Pearls of Power do. All the magic items meant for these classes seem more about overcoming inherent limitations in their primary class features (Sniper Goggles), providing minor augments to those abilities (Duelist Gloves), or allowing slightly better management of their scant daily resources (Ring of Ki Mastery).
In contrast, the magic items that provide armor, saving throw, movement, and other bonuses universally work equally well on a wizard as a fighter and everyone wants them as a result. Martials need all these but they also want the things giving them more combat versatility. These are usually expensive (Wings of Flying), of limited use (Boots of Teleporation), and occupy item slots that might be used for other purposes (Boots of Teleportation vs Boots of Speed). In contrast, there's not much penalty for a witch carrying around 128 scrolls in a few scroll cases or an alchemist having 20 potions on a bandolier. A wizard can break out a metamagic rod without endangering himself in combat and an inquisitor can use a Cure Light Wounds wand between battles to preserve spell resources.
This isn't even getting into how you can't create magic items without a lot of skill points and a feat tax as a non-spell-caster, either.
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WBL does entirely different things for martials and casters. Martials gain abilities they otherwise would not have. Casters extend the use of abilities already possessed, allowing for a longer adventuring day.Martials can't do much except hit things with a stick, so, yes, anything else adds abilities. Casters have spells to do pretty much everything, so yeah, it's hard to add to that.
And at the end of the day, both can fly, both can travel the planes, both can heal, both can kill things.
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I agree, to an extent. In my 3.5 games, no doubt spellcasters could "win" and martials were superfluous once 9th level spells could be cast. But so far, in our games, this has not been a issue.
Our highest level game is only 13th, true. But there, like you said, "Casters are often powerful because their spells have strong synergy with martials." My sorc boosts our Fighter, turning him into a one man unstoppable engine of tanking destruction. GMW, Fly, and Haste are all it takes, and not always fly. So BAM! One boost (we have a bard also, who also boosts, of course) and "one man unstoppable engine of tanking destruction". Battlefield control spells keep hordes of monsters concentrated on the tank- not me.
The fact that most of the 'awesome' options still require team work doesnt mean there isnt a disparity. I would completly concede that baring specific cases (druid and summoner specifically) casters still often need a big tough guy to fight for them.
That doesnt mean that the caster doesnt still have a disproportionate amount of influence over the way encounters go when compared to the mundane characters.
Some have derided this TEAMwork as saying my Sorc is "carrying" the Fighter, but the Fighter also keeps nastys from eating my face, so it is TEAMwork.
For me its not about who is carrying who. Its about being able to influence the story. I am a big proponent of collective storytelling as opposed to one sided story telling in rpgs. As a caster I often have much more influence over how the story progresses (either in the small scale or the large scale) and in fact the gm has to begin to shape the story around me and my abilities as early as 5th or 6th level. For me at least thats the kind of power I am concerned with.
So, I have no doubt it happens. I have seen it in 3.5, but only at levels 17+.
I do want to ask again- who here actually has a serious problem in caster/martial disparity in the games they run at levels under 17? Not theoretical, not one time sitreps where you caster did a "win"- I mean so much so that casters completely rule and martials arent having fun?
I believe the problem appears through all levels of the game. And its not about martial characters not having fun. Its about casters being able to change the shape of the story and encounters in a way martial characters cant match. See my example posted above. 3 of the 5 spells were buff spells, 1 was a debuff that helped the rogue get her sneak attack, that doesnt detract from the fact that it was really the casters that dominated that fight and made it dramatically easier then it would have been without them, even if the barbarian and rogue delivered the killing blows. This was a level 6 game.
Some people have no problem with this kind of 'teamwork' being prominent in the game, but I'd prefer a game system where things were a bit more towards the middle in terms of contribution.
WBL does entirely different things for martials and casters. Martials gain abilities they otherwise would not have. Casters extend the use of abilities already possessed, allowing for a longer adventuring day.Martials can't do much except hit things with a stick, so, yes, anything else adds abilities.
I assume by martials you mean Fighter? Because all the rest of them have plenty of things other than "hit things with a stick". Paladin has curing, buffing, condition removal, is a fantastic Face and even spells. Ranger, Monk archetypes, Cavalier, etc can all do more than "hit things with a stick".
And of course Fighter can deal death from long range with a bow. I guess you could call that "hitting things with a stick".
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I don't remember seeing 3/day use magic items for fighters to suddenly gain the Spring Attack feat chain for free.
There are items that permanently grant feats. Not Spring Attack, but other feats.
The beauty of purchasing more than the "big 6" items is, the flexibility martials are asking for is already mostly available. You just have to spend WBL to get it.
Putting on my devil's advocate hat here...First, thank you for actually trying to understand the situation and keeping the spirit of the OP.
There's just one point I want to address:One side has come down saying 'casters are supreme' and making their argument based on certain theoretical scenarios and on suppositions arising from reading of the rules.You see, it's not theoretical scenarios we're talking about. It's about what actually happens at our tables. Plus, when we actually state exactly what our issues are, they are dismissed as "theorycraft" and "Schroedinger Wizards". That's why I consider such comments condescension, because we've made our points, repeatedly, ad nauseum, in this very thread, and they keep getting dismissed as "your problem, not mine".
I have to say this, someone saying "I don't ever run into the same problems as you" is not being any more dismissive than the person saying "Just because you don't see the problem doesn't mean it isn't there". Stop taking other people's points of view as personal attacks. Your point of view that there is a problem that needs to be addressed is being dismissed just as much as the point of view that there is no problem to be addressed.
EDIT: Here's a proposal for the future of this thread. If all you want to say is "yes, there is a problem with high level casters" simply type "YES THERE IS". If all you want to say is "I've never seen a problem with high level casters" simply type "NO THERE ISN'T". That might make things a bit easier to follow.
And at the end of the day, both can fly, both can travel the planes, both can heal, both can kill things.WBL does entirely different things for martials and casters. Martials gain abilities they otherwise would not have. Casters extend the use of abilities already possessed, allowing for a longer adventuring day.Martials can't do much except hit things with a stick, so, yes, anything else adds abilities. Casters have spells to do pretty much everything, so yeah, it's hard to add to that.
One of the two gets these things as part of their character class. The other gets all but one of them if the dm allows it to be so. Again, martial characters have to rely on either the gm giving them stuff or the casters doing it for them. Casters can do it for themselves.
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And at the end of the day, both can fly, both can travel the planes, both can heal, both can kill things.
So, if we elevate WBL to the point where the fighter can duplicate everything the wizard can do -- i.e., make him a full caster -- then they're on even footing. But if we play using recommended WBL, we're a long way from that point.
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I don't remember seeing 3/day use magic items for fighters to suddenly gain the Spring Attack feat chain for free.There are items that permanently grant feats. Not Spring Attack, but other feats.
The beauty of purchasing more than the "big 6" items is, the flexibility martials are asking for is already mostly available. You just have to spend WBL to get it.
You mean that wealth by level that is nearly as contraversial a 'rule' as the leadership feat?
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I assume by martials you mean Fighter? Because all the rest of them have plenty of things other than "hit things with a stick". Paladin has curing, buffing, condition removal, is a fantastic Face and even spells. Ranger, Monk archetypes, Cavalier, etc can all do more than "hit things with a stick".
Paladins are half-casters with a bunch of other magic, so there you go. Monk archetypes require me to dumpster-dive more than I really care to do right now; but if it's the one that basically gives them spells, well, there's an answer. Rangers would be fully-realized if they could eventually confer planar survival on their allies, follow teleporting quarry, and find the path and discern location, but that's just me dreaming.
Cavaliers can "charge with a stick" instead of "hit with a stick," but they don't get anything like the team buffing and battlefield lockdown abilities some of the knight- and marshall-like classes in 3.5 could acquire.
Putting on my devil's advocate hat here...First, thank you for actually trying to understand the situation and keeping the spirit of the OP.
There's just one point I want to address:One side has come down saying 'casters are supreme' and making their argument based on certain theoretical scenarios and on suppositions arising from reading of the rules.You see, it's not theoretical scenarios we're talking about. It's about what actually happens at our tables. Plus, when we actually state exactly what our issues are, they are dismissed as "theorycraft" and "Schroedinger Wizards". That's why I consider such comments condescension, because we've made our points, repeatedly, ad nauseum, in this very thread, and they keep getting dismissed as "your problem, not mine".
Ok, let me ask this again. Who, as a DM actually has a HUGE "problem" with the caster/martial disparity in their real game? By "problem"- I mean exactly that- no one wants to play a martial as they are completely overshadowed by spellcasters. Paladins, Rangers, Monks, etc are just not a option. No one has fun playing them. Does this occur?
Or is the problem that spellcasters are making it harder for you, as the DM to design scenarios?
I understand and agree that there are scenarios where the spellcaster can pull a "I win" button out. But is that a common, actual "problem"? What happens at your tables that makes spellcasters a "problem"?
One of the two gets these things as part of their character class. The other gets all but one of them if the dm allows it to be so. Again, martial characters have to rely on either the gm giving them stuff or the casters doing it for them. Casters can do it for themselves.And at the end of the day, both can fly, both can travel the planes, both can heal, both can kill things.WBL does entirely different things for martials and casters. Martials gain abilities they otherwise would not have. Casters extend the use of abilities already possessed, allowing for a longer adventuring day.Martials can't do much except hit things with a stick, so, yes, anything else adds abilities. Casters have spells to do pretty much everything, so yeah, it's hard to add to that.
What would you say if you, as a wizard, cast Plane Shift and the GM said it failed? Would you gripe at the GM for taking your powers away because he's a bad GM? Would you start exploring the world to find out why your spell failed? What if the GM had a reason, built into his campaign from the start, for powers not working the way you expected? Would you feel that the GM is just exercising GM fiat to not let your wizard work the way it's supposed to?