I've nerve understood the theory craft of the wizard 'awesome sauce'
as a DM they are the easiest class to kill (well all of the non armored casters are) at lower levels.Everything is easy to kill at low level. One crit from an orc warrior ends most PC's at level 1 because hit points, and even attack bonus are virtually the same.
By the time there is a decent separation a decent player is not that easy to kill. The art in not dying as a wizard/sorc is to not let them get to you. Hiding in the back is a good way to not die. Of course there are always possible ambushes but those are not the norm in most games.
well that IS a built in draw back to wizard/sorc/etc.
don't die before you are useful for more than one combat.
the trade off, as it has always been since the game was invented, is that at high level the wizard is more powerful, but he still needed fighter mooks to keep the groupies off.The disparity in "what is my fighter for" came when the ridiculousness of allowing pew pew pew acrobatic rolls and move while casting came along.
Original rules set didn't allow for such things.
Wizard lovers cried.
Devs delivered… now everyone pisses on the fighter because he sucks…
Umm HELLO… put the full caster back where he was, instead of having an actions arms race.fighters used to be able to attack multiple times in a round, and casters could only cast once… they changed that too..
Action economy/ rules changes etc… keeping moving goal posts and it changes a lot of things ( I also for example doing like where they have gone with a hundreds and hundreds of hit points in the game…. /I remember when 68 was ALOT)
I don't completely agree, but I do agree that mobile fighting should be an option as a core part of the game.
I think that back then everyone was more accepting that "your job is ___". Now it seems that people are less likely to only want to be able to swing a sword or _____. They want more options, and that is the fighter's problem, which is why the slayer looks so attractive, even though it does not get magic like a ranger does.Admittedly I am in this group now which is why I prefer inquisitors, rangers, and bards.
I have several friends that I used to play with back in 2nd Edition and a little bit of 3rd Edition. I recently got back in touch with them and was looking to play again. I had offered them 5th Edition to try. They said they were playing Pathfinder. I replied cool and they asked if I would like to join their game. We continued talking and he began telling me about his character. And as he talked, all I kept hearing him mention was how many attacks he made a round, how much damage he did each hit, and how high his armor class was. Never once did he mention what his character's story was. That told me all I needed to know. My old friends' game may be awesome for them, but it was not something that I would want to play in. To each their own.
I just think that sometimes the role playing gets lost in all the options and rules stating what my character can and cannot do. I get it, with organized play and society play at shops and such a rule is needed for about everything so all the player's understand. I just feel that sometimes all the rules do not enhance the story but hinder it by painting a GM into a corner.
It sounds like your friend enjoys mechanics and was talking about them. The difference between Pathfinder and 2nd Edition is that in Pathfinder you have meaningful mechanical choices whereas the rigidness of 2nd Edition basically meant you were mechanically the same as almost everyone else who played your class and could ONLY distinguish yourself through story. This meant that there was only one specific way to realize a given character.
Essentially you were given a big wooden block and told to solve problems with it. You were able to do a lot of things with it: climb onto high places, weigh down things the wind would otherwise blow away, break things that needed breaking, etc. It was never the ideal tool for the task but it was all you had and so you used it creatively. Now more people have come along to accomplish those same tasks but in addition to the big wooden block they have a full toolbox. They climb using a ladder, keep objects in place with stakes, and break things with a hammer. You then get upset that they aren't using the wooden block in all the same ways you did. In spite of them using the ideal tools for the job you claim that they aren't as smart as you were when using the block. This is a cargo cult mentality wherein you ascribe virtues to restrictions and situations when really the virtue is in the person who was able to work around them. AD&D having few mechanical choices didn't make it better, it actively tried to force you into fantasy pigeonholes and stifled creative thinking. The thing that made you games fun was the creativity that overcame these mechanical deficiencies in the system.
well that IS a built in draw back to wizard/sorc/etc.
don't die before you are useful for more than one combat.
the trade off, as it has always been since the game was invented, is that at high level the wizard is more powerful, but he still needed fighter mooks to keep the groupies off.The disparity in "what is my fighter for" came when the ridiculousness of allowing pew pew pew acrobatic rolls and move while casting came along.
Original rules set didn't allow for such things.
Wizard lovers cried.
Devs delivered… now everyone pisses on the fighter because he sucks…
Umm HELLO… put the full caster back where he was, instead of having an actions arms race.fighters used to be able to attack multiple times in a round, and casters could only cast once… they changed that too..
Action economy/ rules changes etc… keeping moving goal posts and it changes a lot of things ( I also for example doing like where they have gone with a hundreds and hundreds of hit points in the game…. /I remember when 68 was ALOT)
Every edition has made fighters worse for reasons that I don't understand. OD&D had weapon abilities and weapon masteries. AD&D took masteries away and replaced them with proficiencies which were worse mechanically and less flavorful. Then d20 came along and made a fighter sit still to attack multiple times, gave huge penalties to extra attacks, and increased the HP of every enemy dramatically. This seems so unfair. The two to three attacks a high level OD&D or AD&D fight has are so much more useful than the four attacks a d20 fighter because the d20 fighter's third and fourth attack have basically zero chance to actually hit.
That assumes these forums are representative. I would question that assumption. I doubt many casual gamers are taking part in the arcane discussions here. Thus you get the view of the hardcore, which is not representative.Ah but there's more people on here who have a deeper understanding of the rules (and thus are likely making less mistakes), which makes them a better representation of what the game is like when you are getting the rules right.
I'd rather have a smaller sample of people who are more likely to know the rules of a game, then a larger sample of people who are less likely to know the rules of a game. Since the smaller sample of people who are more likely to know the rules of the game will get you feedback on Pathfinder, versus some feedback on Pathfinder and some feedback on GaryFinder and some feedback on SaraFinder, and some feedback on... well you get the idea.
Even among the hardcore, representation varies.
Arm Chair Theorists (Frank Trollman and the Gaming Den), Character Optimizers (Treantmonk), Pro Associated Mechanics (Justin Alexander- The Alexandrian), Campaign Conversions and Narrative Design (KB Jones and Asian Cross- Giant in the Playground).
Also there are many hardcore players who do not take part in forums.
I have several friends that I used to play with back in 2nd Edition and a little bit of 3rd Edition. I recently got back in touch with them and was looking to play again. I had offered them 5th Edition to try. They said they were playing Pathfinder. I replied cool and they asked if I would like to join their game. We continued talking and he began telling me about his character. And as he talked, all I kept hearing him mention was how many attacks he made a round, how much damage he did each hit, and how high his armor class was. Never once did he mention what his character's story was. That told me all I needed to know. My old friends' game may be awesome for them, but it was not something that I would want to play in. To each their own.
I just think that sometimes the role playing gets lost in all the options and rules stating what my character can and cannot do. I get it, with organized play and society play at shops and such a rule is needed for about everything so all the player's understand. I just feel that sometimes all the rules do not enhance the story but hinder it by painting a GM into a corner.
It sounds like your friend enjoys mechanics and was talking about them. The difference between Pathfinder and 2nd Edition is that in Pathfinder you have meaningful mechanical choices whereas the rigidness of 2nd Edition basically meant you were mechanically the same as almost everyone else who played your class and could ONLY distinguish yourself through story. This meant that there was only one specific way to realize a given character.
Essentially you were given a big wooden block and told to solve problems with it. You were able to do a lot of things with it: climb onto high places, weigh down things the wind would otherwise blow away, break things that needed breaking, etc. It was never the ideal tool for the task but it was all you had and so you used it creatively. Now more people have come along to accomplish those same tasks but in addition to the big wooden...
You make a valid point.
However, over reliance on mechanics like in Pathfinder codifies roleplaying games. Stifling creativity because a character can only do what is written down on his (or her) character sheet.
Mechanics are good and necessary, but there comes a point when roleplaying games become too mechanical, dehumanized, pro number crunching and for many old school players this is not what roleplaying games are about. Roleplaying games are about roleplaying.
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You make a valid point.
However, over reliance on mechanics like in Pathfinder codifies roleplaying games. Stifling creativity because a character can only do what is written down on his (or her) character sheet.
Mechanics are good and necessary, but there comes a point when roleplaying games become too mechanical, dehumanized, pro number crunching and for many old school players this is not what roleplaying games are about. Roleplaying games are about roleplaying.
I would actually agree to an extent. Though I don't think the issue is in having too many rules but rather too many gating mechanics and even worse imbalance in gating mechanics. There is an unfortunate design philosophy that seems to go that if something is cool and has rules attached to it then it should be gated off past some class or feat requirement. This leads to really stupid things like combat expertise and fighting defensively being the same thing but one being required for half the combat feats, or worse yet unseat where a common aspect of medievel warfare and knightly stories is impossible unless you've spent feats on this very specific niche case combat scenario. It's for this reason that I really appreciate houserule sets that just assume all players can do all these things. Feats and mechanics should only make cool things easier or more effective, not act as a restriction on problem solving.
I am not saying my friend was wrong in the way he plays. He enjoys that style, I do not.
When I talk about my role playing sessions or my characters, I talk about how my character Baldazac who wore a tye dyed robe and wore sandals stared down an invading army with his miracle whip (which was a normal whip) and prayed to his god, who was off on Thursdays (his day of rest), asking for divine intervention to turn his enemies swords to roses even though he was weak and at times would resort to the drink to ease his pains. Or how he worked to convert everyone he met to his deity.
My friend however when he talks about his sessions, it is that he received a +4 sword that could do ungodly damage when he hit using such and such feat due to his 18 strength. No mention of the story behind how he got such sword or learned to maximize his strength to be able to fell the villain in one blow.
It is just different play styles. My best moments general having nothing to do with how much damage I did or what horrific beast I slayed. Those items aren't that important to me, others may feel different. All I was trying to point out is that much of this discussion is purely about the mechanics of this class or that being inferior to another, but no mention of how said class could be played as a character.
Is a fighter inferior to a paladin? Probably mechanically, but do I care? No because I am too busy having fun with my fighter who wants to be a holy crusader for his deity, but just never seems to be charismatic enough to inspire those around him or just can't even seem to get out of that dubious and morally grey decision that keeps getting him into trouble. People enjoy different styles, but all classes can provide an enjoyable experience in my opinion regardless of their mechanical short comings.
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You are acting as though mechanics and roleplaying are somehow incompatible, that's the issue. You should be roleplaying your mechanics. If mechanics aren't important to you at all, you may end up with a very weak and useless character who if roleplayed properly would not be adventuring. However, you can select the strongest mechanics to represent your character. If you were for example dead set on a whip, Warpriest is the natural choice.
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Mechanics vs. roleplaying becomes an issue when you're trying to create a character who, based on either real life models or common fictional tropes, ought to be a great adventurer, but who in purely mechanical terms is significantly weaker than a character built with different options (crossbow vs. longbow archer, for example).
That's an issue of the mechanics being poorly designed kid not an issue of people being too focused on mechanics. If the mechanics can't give fulfill a cool character concept then there is something wrong with them.
Mechanics vs. roleplaying becomes an issue when you're trying to create a character who, based on either real life models or common fictional tropes, ought to be a great adventurer, but who in purely mechanical terms is significantly weaker than a character built with different options (crossbow vs. longbow archer, for example).
I wonder if maybe, just maybe, that's the reason so many people push for options to be balanced.
(Or not really because that is in fact the reason.)
You are acting as though mechanics and roleplaying are somehow incompatible, that's the issue. You should be roleplaying your mechanics. If mechanics aren't important to you at all, you may end up with a very weak and useless character who if roleplayed properly would not be adventuring. However, you can make select the strongest mechanics to represent your character. If you were for example dead set on a whip, Warpriest is the natural choice.
Agreed, mechanics, and characterization, exposition naturally complement each other (roleplaying).
@Wally.West classic oberoni fallacy.
You are acting as though mechanics and roleplaying are somehow incompatible, that's the issue. You should be roleplaying your mechanics. If mechanics aren't important to you at all, you may end up with a very weak and useless character who if roleplayed properly would not be adventuring. However, you can select the strongest mechanics to represent your character. If you were for example dead set on a whip, Warpriest is the natural choice.
I am not saying anything about mechanics and roleplaying being incompatible. I am saying that my friend and me view the games differently. We discuss our games very differently. He has fun recounting all the mechanical details of his characters and will factor combat mechanics and power in determining what type of character he will play. While I recount memorable moments without mention of actual mechanics. He finds the crunch and maximizing of the systems he plays in enjoyable while I prefer the stories I can tell with my characters.
Many characters are not suited to adventuring. That is why there are so many NPCs that only have a few levels in a class and retire to own a store or pursue a profession. If I created a character that is not mechanically ideal, I am ok with that and have no problems with them dying or deciding to retire when they realize so to speak that they just aren't cut out for the adventuring life.
There is nothing wrong with either way of playing or looking at a game, but there is a difference between the two. In my opinion, any class can be enjoyable regardless of its mechanical shortcomings. A player just needs to find a game that is enjoyable to their play style or accept how the game they play in is ran.
I agree that's a bad mechanic. It's also a bad mechanic when giving a character interesting background skills makes them mechanically weaker than starting out as a blank slate. An RPG should not force players to make tradeoffs between having an interesting character and having an effective build.
I completely agree. There are some interesting backstories supported by Pathfinder but not nearly enough of them, and there are generally too few ways to to fulfill a particular niche.
there's real life playing andNo, there isn't. Because pathfinder is a fantasy game in which players imagine nonexistent things happening in a fictional world. There is nothing 'real life' about pathfinder. There is no magic in real life.
Everything in pathfinder is imaginary. There are no 'real' pathfinder games.
Dude, don't be that guy.
While you may create a great new personality for each one, the mechanics are too restrictive and limited, as you get board with it eventually. It is just too simple for a wider audience. I get the feeling that there is too much at times, because even I think we have gotten to the breaking point, but I love some of the concepts in the ACG and have been waiting for the bloodrager since day one; I find it a good replacement for the hexblade.
You are acting as though mechanics and roleplaying are somehow incompatible, that's the issue. You should be roleplaying your mechanics. If mechanics aren't important to you at all, you may end up with a very weak and useless character who if roleplayed properly would not be adventuring. However, you can make select the strongest mechanics to represent your character. If you were for example dead set on a whip, Warpriest is the natural choice.Agreed, mechanics, and characterization, exposition naturally complement each other (roleplaying).
@Wally.West classic oberoni fallacy.
I would say in the ideal, yes mechanics and rp would/should complement each other. In practice, it would be hard for me to establish any sort of direct or inverse relationship between the two. In some cases one element can give a player ideas for the other. This can really enable the player to experience a great synergistic effect between rules and in character elements and thus build energy/excitement for both.
On the other hand, both mental resources and time are finite resources. In some times and some places for some people mechanics and characterization will compete for these finite resources. This is particularly true when time is limited and there is a mismatch between what is expected between the different players of the game (including the DM.) If a couple of players turns up the dial in power but another couple of players find that keeping up with the first set of players or avoiding holding them back (if the players feel that either is a need) requires the second set to take too much time away from characterization, story, etc., then this is a case where one can come at the expense of another. And vice versa if one group wants to focus more on characterization and it takes another group too much time/focus away from mechanics related gaming activity.
So whereas there is no general inherently hostile relationship between mechanics and story/characterization, under the right circumstances they can compete for the same resources.
I've nerve understood the theory craft of the wizard 'awesome sauce'
as a DM they are the easiest class to kill (well all of the non armored casters are) at lower levels.Everything is easy to kill at low level. One crit from an orc warrior ends most PC's at level 1 because hit points, and even attack bonus are virtually the same.
By the time there is a decent separation a decent player is not that easy to kill. The art in not dying as a wizard/sorc is to not let them get to you. Hiding in the back is a good way to not die. Of course there are always possible ambushes but those are not the norm in most games.
well that IS a built in draw back to wizard/sorc/etc.
don't die before you are useful for more than one combat.
the trade off, as it has always been since the game was invented, is that at high level the wizard is more powerful, but he still needed fighter mooks to keep the groupies off.The disparity in "what is my fighter for" came when the ridiculousness of allowing pew pew pew acrobatic rolls and move while casting came along.
Original rules set didn't allow for such things.
Wizard lovers cried.
Devs delivered… now everyone pisses on the fighter because he sucks…
Umm HELLO… put the full caster back where he was, instead of having an actions arms race.fighters used to be able to attack multiple times in a round, and casters could only cast once… they changed that too..
Action economy/ rules changes etc… keeping moving goal posts and it changes a lot of things ( I also for example doing like where they have gone with a hundreds and hundreds of hit points in the game…. /I remember when 68 was ALOT)
I don't completely agree, but I do agree that mobile fighting should be an option as a core part of the game.
I think that back then everyone was more accepting that "your job is ___". Now it seems that people are less likely to only want to be able to swing a sword or _____. They...
Grit/Panache should have been added to the BASE FIGHTER in the same way the ranger has gotten additional toys over the years with added books.
As the game goes on, people whined about wanting the fighters toys (movement, extra attacks) on different chassis.
The fighter had many enviable things. but now EVERYONE has them.
I recall when spell casting was "what are you doing?"
"prepping my spell"
Ok next round what are you doing
"Still casting"
people thought that sucked… "I don't want to sit at the table while the fighter gets to do this and that"
IT was too slow, boring… I get it.
But you gave away fighters toys and gave the fighter nothing.
dont say fighter is a bad class or poor design, I predates nearly everything it's begin compared to , and was plagiarized and stolen from.
Heck there are still discussions on these boards about people complaining they can't get access to fighter only feats…. if you give those away what DOES the fighter have?
AND there are SOME new classes that DO steal fighter only feats…WHA the FA.
gunslinger and swashbuckler should have been fighter archetypes.
Devs missed the boat by not giving that pool to the base fighter…. IMHO.
a simple additional standard action, or the ability to move and full attack would fix it too.
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I do think the fighter is poorly designed, and it could have been improved upon. I don't put all of that on the devs because there was a playtest, even though I was not part of it. They were kinda married to 3.5, and going too are from it was a big risk. If this was 2007/2008 again I think the fighter would look different now. The fighter only feats are not really all that great so I don't mind them being opened up if the fighter gets something in return such as feats that scale for only the fighter and/or more out of combat options that don't require an archetype.
As an example the shield focus feat could get better as you go up in level. Improved Initiative could scale also. If feats are his class feature he should get more out of the same feats. The ability the brawler gets to retrain feats on command is something the fighter should have already had. I had the idea when I was on the 3.5 boards, but I did not really know much about Paizo, so I was not really here until about the time the final release was done. Of course I might have been ignored, but I would have tried.
On the other hand, both mental resources and time are finite resources. In some times and some places for some people mechanics and characterization will compete for these finite resources. This is particularly true when time is limited and there is a mismatch between what is expected between the different players of the game (including the DM.) If a couple of players turns up the dial in power but another couple of players find that keeping up with the first set of players or avoiding holding them back (if the players feel that either is a need) requires the second set to take too much time away from characterization, story, etc., then this is a case where one can come at the expense of another. And vice versa if one group wants to focus more on characterization and it takes another group too much time/focus away from mechanics related gaming activity.
So whereas there is no general inherently hostile relationship between mechanics and story/characterization,...
The idea of finite mental resources is missing the point of enjoying mechanics. If your rules aren't good enough to encourage emergent story then your rules aren't worth using at all. If you think Pathfinder's rules are so bad they hinder roleplaying don't play Pathfinder. If there was a videogame whose mechanics were bad enough that they made me dislike the game itself, but I loved the story, I'd just watch the cutscenes on youtube. Life is too short to use a system that when utilized harms your ability to have fun. In the same way a rules lite system is probably what you're going for. Personally though my own somewhat heavily houseruled 3.P game does have plenty of emergent story. Heck half of my quirky mini bosses came from tinkering with weird class/prestige class combinations.
Like I said.
Improvements to the fighter without getting TOO far out of whack were GREAT in 2008.
The fighter WAS, for the most part fixed. It was playable.
the out of combat thing is just nagging. Because the barbarian can't do a whole lot and neither can samurai or cavalier.
the problem with subsequent play tests is they played NEW stuff checking out all the new toys, but didn't keep in check anything that was stuck to "backwards compatibility" like was a big issue for rogue and fighter.
During the early play tests for core, LOTS of ideas and improvements were thrown around only to have the "Backwards compatibility" boulder dropped on them squashing them like a bug.
BECAUSE back when they were making core, that IS what they where making, a backwards compatible game…NOT a new one.
BUT it's lame to then move forward and give, for example things to the ranger like trap skills (and the archeologist bard for example) and extra fighting style for the ranger (and steal thunder from the fighter) and never do ay more work on the older classes.
In 2009-2010 time frame there were A LOT of posts on here griping about how groups HAD to have a rogue, and what if they didn't WANT a rogue and whine, cry, snivel.
So they gave rogues toys to other classes and now the criticism of the rogue is you don't need him anymore?
I think that's pretty foul play.
Ninja should NEVER have happened in my opinion.
Could have easily played a rogue and called yourself a ninja using different archetypes and new rogue talents.
but you can't go back 6 years and say "the 2008 F-150 sucks, because… 2014 yo!"
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I'm glad they gave us workable classes to fill the Rogues shoes, since we have yet to get those "amazing Rogue talents". And isn't a Rogue by any other name still a Rogue? It is for me, but that's because again, I think in terms of characters, not classes.
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I agree with mostly everyone in this discussion. While preparing for my game last week, I was wondering how to make the greatest team leader I could for my E8 game. I thought, is he a Paladin? A bard with Perform(Military Pep-talk)? A Hunter?
He ended up being an ungodly mash of Brawler, Cavalier and Slayer. He doesn't fight with fists, lances, bows or swords. I never mentioned the class(es) to my players. I have one who is quite good at building things in Pathfinder, one who mostly looks at guides, but isn't too good with them, and three newbies. None of them asked about class levels, or anything, they just heard rumors about how good of a tactician he was (by beating another NPC, a Spellslinger Wizard, another combo that they are unaware of) at chess, by listening to marines on the docks and stuff like that.
Is the Commander optimized? Hell yeah, he is. Is he someone with character? Hell yeah.
What I'm saying is, I've only been playing Pathfinder for less than a year, but I think I could safely say that I'm quite a bit above average at system mastery than other players, and I'm aware of that fact. What I don't do, but see some players/GMs do, is use that to squeeze every single bonus out of it. I don't want to be playing the 7 Str 20 Dex Shocking Grasp magus who has the same heritage as the other magus at the table, and when asked about it, to mumble something. I want to play the 10 Str 18 Dex Shocking Grasp Magus, and when confronted about it to mention my cousin Dave Stevelarry, my faster and physically weaker cousin, and how we decided to find out who's better on the road. When that happens, usually the other player laughs and we develop a backstory.
The thing is, I know, it's tempting to show how much better you can be than the other dudes at the table, but think of them as well. No one likes it when the Ranger who put some points in Charisma, because he's new and shy and thinks that Wild Empathy is actually good, is overshadowed in every way by Shadow, the Tattooed Crossblooded Draconic/Orc Sorcerer, who comes from Magaambya, but doesn't know anything about it, because he has amnesia and keeps talking about optimizing, breaking the game, and abusing feats/items/traits.
I had a group, my first one in fact, that every time we were in a city, guys would stop and try and squeeze this weird named item, because it stacked with something and something and something, when I was actually worried about the g#*@*!n undead army in the elven lands. I went with it, I learned about all that, I rebuild the character, after the GM allowed it, I 1v1'd a boss fight, then stopped and asked the guards of an ancient tomb why the heck they were stopping us, when we just want to pass. The GM considered the fact that he just put 2 random Fire Elementals there, and hadn't considered payments, days off, sick days and stuff, and they just left. Not a single cha check from my BSF.
I apologize for the walls of text, but those were just things I wanted to tell people.
TL;DR: If you know the system, forget about it for a second, and think of a cinematic where your character stars to his strengths and weaknesses. THEN come up with a class. If you don't know the system, talk to the GM about it, and ask him if this option is good enough, and ask for advice. About that character, and not "how to do it better", I've seen plenty of that on those forums, and it kind of makes me sad.
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No, what happened was that the fire elementals realized how unhappy with their boss (to speak of) they are, by the action of the character, not the player, and left, because they had no reason to remain there, story-wise.
We did get XP.
We had a short talk with the elementals to point that fact out.
I fail to understand your last sentence, sorry. Do you mean talking to NPCs isn't part of the game? That other characters shouldn't get XP for being prepared to take part in the possible combat? Or if a bystander, if say, we were playing in a cafe, could've said that this makes no sense and the Elementals shouldn't be there? So a bystander wouldn't have been able to point that out, since he hasn't talked to them.
As ranty as my post sounded, it was more of an explanation how I think things work out nicely, based on my (admittedly short) gaming experience and observations.
The idea of finite mental resources is missing the point of enjoying mechanics. If your rules aren't good enough to encourage emergent story then your rules aren't worth using at all. If you think Pathfinder's rules are so bad they hinder roleplaying don't play Pathfinder. If there was a videogame whose mechanics were bad enough that they made me dislike the game itself, but I loved the story, I'd just watch the cutscenes on youtube. Life is too short to use a system that when utilized harms your ability to have fun. In the same way a rules lite system is probably what you're going for. Personally though my own somewhat heavily houseruled 3.P game does have plenty of emergent story. Heck half of my quirky mini bosses came from tinkering with weird class/prestige class combinations.On the other hand, both mental resources and time are finite resources. In some times and some places for some people mechanics and characterization will compete for these finite resources. This is particularly true when time is limited and there is a mismatch between what is expected between the different players of the game (including the DM.) If a couple of players turns up the dial in power but another couple of players find that keeping up with the first set of players or avoiding holding them back (if the players feel that either is a need) requires the second set to take too much time away from characterization, story, etc., then this is a case where one can come at the expense of another. And vice versa if one group wants to focus more on characterization and it takes another group too much time/focus away from mechanics related gaming activity.
So whereas there is no general inherently hostile relationship between mechanics and story/characterization,...
In most cases, it's not the rules, it's the attitude of the players.
From my perspective, balance is the key. A player who makes every decision the optimal decision is playing a wargame not a roleplaying game.
DPR spreadsheets, intricately thought out tactical choices, character description that is optimal for all encounters etc. Maybe the character has low Wisdom and makes brash decisions, for a pure Character Optimizer there isn't going to be any brash decisions no matter what the Wisdom score is of the character.
I remember reading that Gary Gygax wanted to keep D&D simple with the basic classes - but he was also the one responsible for adding the alternative classes in Unearthed Arcana all those years ago.
Nothing in the rules states you have to use anything you don't. Don't want to mess with anything outside of fighter, wizard, rogue, cleric - then stick with the Core book.
If you want to have fun with all those other whacky classes, then go for it!
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I remember reading that Gary Gygax wanted to keep D&D simple with the basic classes - but he was also the one responsible for adding the alternative classes in Unearthed Arcana all those years ago.
Nothing in the rules states you have to use anything you don't. Don't want to mess with anything outside of fighter, wizard, rogue, cleric - then stick with the Core book.
If you want to have fun with all those other whacky classes, then go for it!
I'll try to dig up the exact quote here but Gygax was very much of the opinion that you should increase or decrease classes to accommodate players. The example he gave was if you were running an evil campaign and someone wanted to play a Balrog the DM should find a way to make them a class to undergoes gradual growth as a fire spirit into full balrog powers. It's the same reason thief acrobat and cavalier were introduced to the game, his players wanted to play something slightly outside of the original boxes so he accommodated them. It really showed the best way to use rules to help forge a story. The first question is "what is your character" and then you figure out the rules to make that character, instead of starting with the rules and making your character based off them. Sadly the starting with rules is a trap that almost every oldschool "there should only be four classes" type people fall into.
there's real life playing and then there's theory crafting.
I just got done a few weeks ago, or rather simply left a thread right here on this board going on about how the rangers favored enemy and terrain were no good and should be re written, because it's not fair if they have to fight non favored enemies or go to non favored terrain.
seriously, if you search you can find it.
Some people not knowing how to play certain classes does not make those classes bad, it just means the player or GM does not know what they are doing. Ranger is one of my favorite classes and in addition to consistently being the best damage dealer in the group they are also one of the best classes with skills. They've got spells they can use to apply their favored enemy and favored terrain class features to anything, they get to automatically share those bonuses with their animal companion or half of those bonuses with all of their allies, and every adventure path I have ever played in includes a guide of what favored enemies and terrains you should be looking at. Rangers also get to pick up any cool weapon that drops and use it just as well as any other weapon while fighters get locked in to one specific weapon group so the ranger is actually more versatile in combat than the fighter.
On the original subject, other posters have already pointed out that archetypes are balanced as a package not class feature by class feature. Full classes also get to swap out parts of the class that archetypes do not normally touch like saves, base attack bonus, hit die and other pieces that are normally more essential to the class. I think there's pretty much just the right number of classes for the concepts Paizo has chosen to support.
Like I said.
Improvements to the fighter without getting TOO far out of whack were GREAT in 2008.
The fighter WAS, for the most part fixed. It was playable.
the out of combat thing is just nagging. Because the barbarian can't do a whole lot and neither can samurai or cavalier.
The barbarian has twice as many base skill points as the fighter and gets the all important perception as a class skill. The cavalier also gets twice as many skill points and has a reason to put points in charisma. Pointing out that a class is literally half as competent as his peers isn't nagging.