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Alright people, we need to talk about something that has bothered me for years: Bad Party Balance in Fantasy Movies. Obviously, as dedicated Pathfinder members, I'm sure this upsets you as much as it does me so lets dive in:
The Hobbit: Terrible party, even in the movie when they try to add two rangers that weren't in the source material. The Party is way overloaded with Melee fighters and no healers. They do bring a rogue and a wizard but that wizard keeps leaving the damn party for side quests.
Lord of the Rings: Better, good balance of ranged and melee and the Wizard levels up at one point, but again no healer? Seriously? No wonder they lose a party member so early on.
Conan the Barbarian: Surprisingly solid party, Barbarian, Rogue, Ranger, and a Wizard. They lose the ranger because again, no healer, but the Barbarian has tons of HP.
Conan the Destroyer: Wow, even better party. Barbarian, Rogue, Wizard, Ranger, Fighter, and what appears to be some kind of Oracle. No healer but that girl has tons of Charisma.
Krull: Actually, best party yet. Two Rogues, two Rangers, A Fighter and a Barbarian. Some kind of shapeshifting Druid/Mage multiclass, one Magus, a War Priest, A Cyclops Oracle, and at one point they bring two Clerics. Sadly, they lose the healer Cleric on like the second encounter because the idiot left the party. Still the party has great tactics for most of the film and use tons of flanking maneuvers. They lose a lot of party members but only because this is a seriously tough campaign.
Harry Potter: Nothing but wizards, no healer, no melee, no ranged for a Seven Part Campaign? How are they not dead?
Shannara Chronicles: Not out yet but the TV show looks super unbalanced party wise. If I was their DM they would all be dead in Episode two.
Game of Thrones: I know the Lannisters and the Baratheons are awful people but you know what? Cersei is smart enough to have a healer and that healer has "raise dead" while Stannis has a Cleric with the Fire Domain. Danerys has high CHA but not high enough to build a kingdom single -handedly so she's smart enough to add a Rogue/ Bard and a Halfling Bard, but question: why is the Halfling Bard the most effective character on the show? This is a weird campaign. Also, way too much PVP for my taste.
Snow White and the Huntsman: One Ranger soloing his way through an adventure does not a party make. Plus the Fighter/Bard heroine is way too low level for most of the adventure and is frankly not the greatest RPer.
Princess Bride: Okay, for real, I love this party. Giant sized Brawler with tons of STR, a Fighter with lots of INT, a Swashbuckler, and at one point they remembered to get a Healer. Smart use of tactics and that Swashbuckler has got DEX for days, dude crits every roll. No ranged or magic users but damned if they ain't scrappy enough to pull it off. At one point they even win their loot rolls and get a magic cloak for their Brawler that adds +5 CHA to his Intimidate rolls. Bless these guys, I would crawl through dungeons with them any time.
Dragonslayer: A conjuring wizard with heavy weapon proficiency solos a dragon? Yeah. Sure. Whatever.
Willow: There's a lot of hirelings and NPCs at the beginning but the main party is pretty good. A Halfling Mage with a unique wand of transmogrify, Two pixies, Half-Elf Sorceress with a Fey Bloodline power, and a Fighter with the Two Weapon Fighting Feat. They later add a Ranger after her character experiences an alignment shift and briefly they have a Paladin NPC. But the stars of the movie are the villains who are perfect: trolls, a hydra with a fire breath weapon, a CE Arcanist with what appears to be some kind of Abyssal Bloodline power, And the best character in the movie: A g#$$++ned Anti-Paladin. Not just an Anti-Paladin but like the best example of what a LE Anti-Paladin should look like.
Labyrinth: Solid party. Gnome Rogue, Kitsune Cavalier, and some kind of Troll Druid. Leading them is pretty, pretty Bard who is super pretty and...very pretty. Wow, I need to sit down.
Pirates of the Caribbean: No healers but lots of Melee and damned if Johnny Depp has the CHA to talk his way out of anything. Except poor box office receipts, he's bad at that.
Legend: Rangers, Fighters, still no Healer, but I guess the Fairy girl counts as a magic user. Although I gotta admit, props to whoever designed the villain for this encounter, you don't get much more epic than Asmodeous himself, You know what I mean? But...how do you even stat that fight?
Army of Darkness: This movie has Bruce Campbell in it. No party is needed because Bruce Campbell can solo anything because Bruce Campbell's Character Class is Bruce Campbell, which is a prestige class and he has Seventeen levels in it. Sauron? Chainsaw to the face. Palpatine? Bruce would make him eat that lightsaber. Voldemort? He's technically an undead Mage and the Bruce's shotgun autocrits on Undead. Decepticons? More like Decepticorpses. Bruce Campbell can only be defeated by another Stronger, more Experienced Bruce Campbell.
The Walking Dead: A party full of stupid awful people. Call Bruce Campbell.
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Narratives do not suffer from things like PCs. It is all created by writers. If this were a mystery genre, it is easy to see how the difference stands out.
In an RPG, the GM creates challenges for the group of players. If a murder mystery is presented, the group has t scratch their heads, question the GM endlessly, and try to figure it out. It is an actual struggle.
In a novel or movie, the writer already knows the mystery. The writer knows who was murdered, how, and why. The challenge is to have the main character solve it in such a way that it doesn't seem to easy (why did they need the main hero detective if the mystery is obvious to solve?) nor can it seem incredibly obscure (make sure the hero detective finds clues that the audience can follow along, rather than get the sense that plot convenience or plot holes leads to solving the mystery).
RPG games - your audience is your own playing group. You can tailor things to your audience more easily. Books and movies - you want to appeal to as many people as possible to rake in money.
Also, different games require different balances. Pathfinder is very different from games like...say Champions. With four superheroes you don't need a "fighter, cleric, wizard, thief" combination, yet you might benefit from a "flying brick, scrapper, psychic, and blaster" type of group.
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*blink*
Guys...do you...have a sense of humor?
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Right, since nobody else is joining the fun...
Fullmetal Alchemist (Brotherhood): Party looks bad at first with a kensai magus focusing on his arm blade and some kind of construct PC, but I wouldn't write them off that fast. One's crazy good with tactics and has a massive library of spells to pick from and can heal the construct, while the construct has great AC and a good amount of hardness to keep him up in the harshest of battles. It also helps that they have a s@~#load of NPC support. Sadly the magus dumped wis a bit badly and argues a lot with the helpful NPCs and the construct party member.
Argh, wish I could have done a better job with that.
So far in this party, we have a weretiger, and werefalcon, a jester, and now a flying skull. Still no healer, and no sense of humor.
YOUR HEALNUT HAS ARRIVED!
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YOUR HEALNUT HAS ARRIVED!
Good God! Finally!
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Right, since nobody else is joining the fun...
Fullmetal Alchemist (Brotherhood): Party looks bad at first with a kensai magus focusing on his arm blade and some kind of construct PC, but I wouldn't write them off that fast. One's crazy good with tactics and has a massive library of spells to pick from and can heal the construct, while the construct has great AC and a good amount of hardness to keep him up in the harshest of battles. It also helps that they have a s~$!load of NPC support. Sadly the magus dumped wis a bit badly and argues a lot with the helpful NPCs and the construct party member.
I feel that the Elrics Brothers also did a CHA dump cause they are damn whiny in those early episodes of the first series.
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Well there was that one movie, Dungeons and Dragons. But I guess it had good party balance....
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So far in this party, we have a weretiger, and werefalcon, a jester, and now a flying skull. Still no healer, and no sense of humor.*blink*
Guys...do you...have a sense of humor?
Don't even get me started on Smurf parties . . . .
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I can't disagree with your assessment of Labyrinth,I appreciated different things in that movie at different ages. :P
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I can't disagree with your assessment of Labyrinth,I appreciated different things in that movie at different ages. :P
I know, right? Jennifer Connelly is like weaponized pretty.
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Thinking back a while ...
Star Wars (IV): Good thing the GM killed off his GMPC early, there's nothing more annoying. That left the PC paladin, a rogue, barbarian and ... was she a bard? Plus the pair of helpless experts doing comic relief. I guess the GM hadn't quite got that urge out of his system. The core 4 are OK though.
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Legend of Zelda: Elven Fighter has a metric ton of gear, and sometimes he dabbles in magic. He always beats the BBEG, a wereboar Eldrich Knight.
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Firefly: A couple of gunslingers (Ma & Zoe), a brawler (Jayne), a healer (Simon), a psychic ninja (River), a geisha (Inara), a monk (Shepard Book), a tinkerer (Kaylee), and an Expert who has maxed out Spaceship Pilot (Wash). Pretty decent balance.
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I can't disagree with your assessment of Labyrinth,I appreciated different things in that movie at different ages. :PI know, right? Jennifer Connelly is like weaponized pretty.
She would have been better if she didn't take the feat Hollywood Diet halfway through her career.
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She would have been better if she didn't take the feat Hollywood Diet halfway through her career.I can't disagree with your assessment of Labyrinth,I appreciated different things in that movie at different ages. :PI know, right? Jennifer Connelly is like weaponized pretty.
No lie, still in love with her.
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Thinking back a while ...
Star Wars (IV): Good thing the GM killed off his GMPC early, there's nothing more annoying. That left the PC paladin, a rogue, barbarian and ... was she a bard? Plus the pair of helpless experts doing comic relief. I guess the GM hadn't quite got that urge out of his system. The core 4 are OK though.
I would say Bard with levels of Fighter.
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Firefly: A couple of gunslingers (Ma & Zoe), a brawler (Jayne), a healer (Simon), a psychic ninja (River), a geisha (Inara), a monk (Shepard Book), a tinkerer (Kaylee), and an Expert who has maxed out Spaceship Pilot (Wash). Pretty decent balance.
I would say out of every example given, Firefly has the most solid party balance. They even have a healer.
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The Last Unicorn
So, we've got a barely first level sorcerer with some kind of crazy custom bloodline, a unicorn druid archetyped into something that loses wild shape and never took natural spell to be able to cast in a form other than her base (completely hosing her when she's polymorphed), and they pick up a commoner. No wonder they have such difficulty.
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The Last Unicorn
So, we've got a barely first level sorcerer with some kind of crazy custom bloodline, a unicorn druid archetyped into something that loses wild shape and never took natural spell to be able to cast in a form other than her base (completely hosing her when she's polymorphed), and they pick up a commoner. No wonder they have such difficulty.
Yeah, that movie irks me. So the bad guy is a really big bull that scares unicorns? Doesn't kill them, just sort of spooks them.
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Kung Fu Panda: A party full of monks, fighting another, much more stronger monk BBEG. The lower-level newb Monk rolls pretty damn well on his bluff checks to unnerve the BBEG. Wins thanks to a combination of the GM putting him through Monk Bootcamp w/ "instant level 15 if you solve this riddle MacGuffin", and rolling REALLY well on his bluff.
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The Last Unicorn
So, we've got a barely first level sorcerer with some kind of crazy custom bloodline, a unicorn druid archetyped into something that loses wild shape and never took natural spell to be able to cast in a form other than her base (completely hosing her when she's polymorphed), and they pick up a commoner. No wonder they have such difficulty.
Yeah, that movie irks me. So the bad guy is a really big bull that scares unicorns? Doesn't kill them, just sort of spooks them.
At least it's unintentionally funny in retrospect. Why do the unicorns fear Red Bull, are they worried about getting wings?
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Kung Fu Panda: A party full of monks, fighting another, much more stronger monk BBEG. The lower-level newb Monk rolls pretty damn well on his bluff checks to unnerve the BBEG. Wins thanks to a combination of the GM putting him through Monk Bootcamp w/ "instant level 15 if you solve this riddle MacGuffin", and rolling REALLY well on his bluff.
Not to mention that mid way through the movie, bad guy Monk faces a LITERAL ARMY and smokes the whole crew using what I can only assume is GMPC-FU!
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Kung Fu Panda: A party full of monks, fighting another, much more stronger monk BBEG. The lower-level newb Monk rolls pretty damn well on his bluff checks to unnerve the BBEG. Wins thanks to a combination of the GM putting him through Monk Bootcamp w/ "instant level 15 if you solve this riddle MacGuffin", and rolling REALLY well on his bluff.Not to mention that mid way through the movie, bad guy Monk faces a LITERAL ARMY and smokes the whole crew using what I can only assume is GMPC-FU!
Seriously. Only reason Po beat Tai Lung is because Tai Lung got thrown off balance mentally in the fight with Shifu, then wound up witnessing Po do some parkour stuff that he (or Jackie Chan in any live-action film ever) did even better during his prison break, and thought that the tubby panda wound up some Kung Fu god. Tai Lung lost, because he beat himself.
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Chronicles of Narnia: Paladin, bow fighter, fighter-turned-paladin, and nature-god cleric load up on magic items and get some mythic powers from a lion god in order to take down a White Witch. The local church's pastor is the GM.
I heard that game was super railroady, and the whole thing turned out be just playing second fiddle to a DMPC turned deus ex machina.
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The Dresden Files: Evocation-specialized Wizard gestalts with Investigator, Brawler, and a little bit of Gunslinger. Everything explodes.
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For the following party, I'm counting both the character and the thing they summon as one entity.
Jojo's Bizarre Adventure, Stardust Crusaders: We got a Brawler, a Hydrokinetisist, a Swashbuckler, A Pyrokinetisist, a rogue that VMCs into cleric, and an awakened dog hunter without an animal companion. No healer among them but they make up for it with ridiculous constitution, hero points, and the fact that the GM gives makes liberal use of the rule of cool. Talking is also a free action and everyone has max ranks in perform (pose.)
Rogue is the brawler's grandpa and was the star of the last campaign, doesn't get much time to shine in the spotlight and is okay with that. Pyrokinetisist also doesn't get much time to shine, in fact he's not even with the party for a little bit, but gets a few good episodes and one liners here and there. Dog is CN as f%*@ and only gets three fights to be a badass, which he's also fine with since he's really only there to roleplay as a jerk for comic relief. (Also his second fight is f!&@ing brutal.) Swashbuckler is a butt monkey that dumped wis pretty hard but also badass when it's his turn to fight (and he gets quite a few turns) and shows that you don't need no sticking slashing grace to be badass. Hydrokineticist prefers to use the spray infusion than the normal blast, gets plenty of time to shine in the first half of the campaign but spends most of the second half blind. Brawler is the star of the show and gets the most badass moments. Loves to flurry and happens to be really good at it. Wis is pretty high and used Focused Study to get skill focus in perception, sense motive, and bluff. Dumped charisma as well but uses traits to boost up bluff a bit.
GM just loves to homebrew and most fights are against weaker but more skilled opponents, and the PCs often have to figure out just how to beat them. Straight up brawls are rare and usually end with a long flurry of blows to the bad guy. Final bad guy is a vampire that requires a will save to not want to be f%#+ed by him and unless you are that specific party you're gonna fail that save even if you are straight. (Seriously, I know the straightest possible guy out there and even he's attracted to Dio.)
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Harry Potter: Nothing but wizards, no healer, no melee, no ranged for a Seven Part Campaign? How are they not dead?
I am pretty sure some of them are witches which covers healing part.
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Harry Potter: Nothing but wizards, no healer, no melee, no ranged for a Seven Part Campaign? How are they not dead?I am pretty sure some of them are witches which covers healing part.
Sorcerers, really - their magic's in their blood.
Hermione could be argued to be the exception. Otherwise:
Weasley: Impossible
Potter: Destined, with a bonus Eldritch Heritage (Martyred)
Malfoy: Imperious
Lestrange: Abyssal
Longbottom: Verdant
Hagrid: Oni
Riddle/Gaunt: Serpentine
Dumbledore: Celestial
Lovegood: Aberrant
Snape: Alchemist with Eldritch Heritage (Psychic)
Lockhart: Sorcerer of Sleep
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Sorcerers, really - their magic's in their blood.Harry Potter: Nothing but wizards, no healer, no melee, no ranged for a Seven Part Campaign? How are they not dead?I am pretty sure some of them are witches which covers healing part.
More like arcanists. Magic's in the blood but they have to study like mad.
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Is there a movie party with a healing caster in it? I don't think I've encountered much healing magic outside D&D or video games.
I hate that I know this, but Vampire Academy has a healer (of the "fully restore from the verge of death" type).
To keep up the theme, Vampire Academy is an entire school made up of elemental Oracles and their monk bodyguards while their enemies are barbarians.
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Gauntlet:
Like far too many parties, no healer. A barbarian, a fighter (Or perhaps paladin), a ranger, and a wizard. This wouldn't be horrible, except that for a party that needs its rest, they're sure driven to the limit, to the point that the GM forces them to record every meal. And the adventure is just a meaningless dungeon crawl.
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Castlevania 3:
You'd think if you were going up against a Vampire and his undead minions, that a cleric, or any sort of positive energy, would be all but required. It's also rather weird to make an entire adventure revolve around the fighter, with what I'm guessing is a spiked chain houseruled from 3.5.
The rogue knows how to max out his climb skill, though. Gotta give him props for that. The female wizard with a few ranks in disguise is interesting, though not really used past her backstory.
The Dhampir Kineticist with a few levels of druid was an eclectic, and not entirely effective mix. Don't ask about the solo campaign the DM ran for him a few years later. I don't even know what houseruled monstrosity he rebuilt his character into there.
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Shadowgate:
No, Mr. GM, the fighter going through an entire dungeon solo does not disprove the Caster/Martial Disparity. Especially when the fighter was so poorly made that every encounter with a creature would have resulted in his death if you didn't play every monster like an idiot. Finding the Deus Ex Machina Staff so conveniently in the dungeon that killed the final boss in one hit does not prove your point at all. Especially as all the puzzles challenged the player, not the character.
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Heretic:
Another solo adventure, this time with an elven magus. The amount of healing potions just left around was a bit jarring, but the player really showed his stuff. Loved some of those magic items the DM homebrewed for this adventure. I'll have to check them out.
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Hexen:
Solid combination. Warrior, Mage, Cleric. No skill monkey, but it was mostly a dungeon romp and the DM prefers traps that require player intelligence instead of character skill checks anyways. Three people is a bit sparse, but I say it worked well.
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Hexen 2:
At first glance, this party was solid. Filling the four basic roles of fighter, mage, cleric, thief. But putting a LG Paladin, a NG Cleric, a LE Necromancer, and a CE Assassin in the same party was just asking for trouble. Adding a NE Tiefling Sorcerer later on did nothing to help party unity.
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I can't disagree with your assessment of Labyrinth,I appreciated different things in that movie at different ages. :PI know, right? Jennifer Connelly is like weaponized pretty.
Watch Requiem for a Dream. The only thing Connelly (or Leto for that matter) will ever arouse in you ever again is severe existential dread.
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Watch Requiem for a Dream. The only thing Connelly (or Leto for that matter) will ever arouse in you ever again is severe existential dread.I can't disagree with your assessment of Labyrinth,I appreciated different things in that movie at different ages. :PI know, right? Jennifer Connelly is like weaponized pretty.
Thanks to Gladiator, all Jared Leto inspires for me at the moment is a strong urge for facepunching. :P
The Hobit Movies: 13 fighters, 1 rogue, and a gmpc wizard that shows up once in a while to save the party and no healer
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Record of Lodoss War: though life forces the party members into background or "out of action" roles sometimes, when all the PCs are together, the balance is superb. Story is solid, too!
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I fell hard for her too when I first saw . Then my best friend laughingly and helpfully told me, "Dude, she's old enough to be your mother". And <checking Internet>... <pop> * <pop> my crush is gone like a fart in a hurricane. I've hated the Internet ever since.I can't disagree with your assessment of Labyrinth,I appreciated different things in that movie at different ages. :PI know, right? Jennifer Connelly is like weaponized pretty.
Again, I don't care! I lived in LA for two years and I got kind of used to the skinny forty five year old MILF. She's still my girl.
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I blame his hair stylist.She is still stunning.
She was almost as pretty as David Bowie in Labyrinth.
no one could ever be as pretty as David Bowie back then
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no one could ever be as pretty as David Bowie back thenI blame his hair stylist.She is still stunning.
She was almost as pretty as David Bowie in Labyrinth.
He married supermodel Iman, and I remember thinking, 'They must go through more on hair care products in that house than we spend on electricity...'