Poll: Do you like playing Martials or Casters more?

[Heather 540]

I haven't played many of them, but I like making characters for Pathfinder. Figuring out what I want to do with them and how to do it is fun for me. Sometimes I have a character idea in mind first - tomboy princess that has to sneak out to adventure. I then have to figure out what class and feats get me that - Bard/Swashbuckler. Sometimes I just want to make a particular class or fighting style and race - Halfling Hunter. I then start finding out what type of person is - the hunter is a young woman who had been orphaned by an accident at a young age, raised by a magical beast in the forest, and has to relearn how to interact with people.

Many of my characters are classes that have magic - Bard, Hunter, Inquisitor. But the magic is not the focus, the martial fighting is. I only have 2 purely magic-focused characters and both have to be rebuilt from the ground up anyway.

I guess martial characters are simply easier for me to make since they're more straight-forward.

[The Dandy Lion]

Casters for me.

I'm a junkie for resource management and I love the kind of things magic users can get up to in downtime. While I enjoy the theory involved in building martials, I find that feats, traits etc are tight enough that I don't have the freedom to play the stuff I want most of the time, whereas spell acquisition is much more dynamic and even story involved.

That said, I still prefer putting a stick in things or tripping fools over ending a fight in one spell. Gishes are where it's really at. I'll take my Magi, Warpriests and Occultists with 5 different resource pools each.

[Klorox]

I have a thing for casters, definitely... my all times favorite character was a AD&D Magic User, next come a AD&D bard... of course, these were youth experiences, my first characters to reach such high levels... then again, really high level characters are rare in my career.

I don't necessarily dislike martials, I played a ranger not too long ago, and I love playing samurai types in Shadowrun... but the reason I like Shadowrun better than other cyberpunk games is because they have magic.

[Reksew_Trebla]

Dysphoria Blues wrote:

I've enjoyed reading through all these posts! It's always enjoyable to see other players' lines of thinking when it comes to character execution. Also, I love me some necro-ing.

In response to Reksew_Trebla: "Impressiveness" is subjective. When you ask "Can a caster do something as impressive against the typical group of enemies?" my response is yes. Especially right off the bat at first level. Spells like color spray and sleep can end an entire encounter instantaneously against "typical enemies," whereas the martial classes have to relegate themselves to a single attack per single enemy every round. I liken it to Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. Indie is facing off against the expert falchion-wielding martial. This particular martial uses Dazzling Display in attempt to debuff Indie who in turn just ends the encounter with a well-placed shot. Although Indie would undoubtedly be a martial himself, it illustrates the point that impressiveness is subjective. What do we find more impressive? The obvious expertise of the falchion-wielding martial? Or, the pragmatic simplicity of Indie's abilities? Sure, a fighter can take his chances with his Cleave feat to hit multiple enemies, but the caster who invested in Improved Initiative got to go first and end the encounter before it even started, therefore saving the entire party's resources, HP, abilites, etc. for future encounters. I find that more impressive.

However, I recognize that this is probably not within the spirit of your assertion. With the Dimensional line of feats you listed there comes a well-built pizazz, if you will. A complex series of maneuvers pulled off by well-selected feats and class features which outshine a single standard action casting of a spell. (Hopefully I am not incorrect in assuming your are envisioning the excellent opening scene of X2 where Nightcrawler works his way through the entire White House and into the Oval Office. That is certainly a use of the...

Yes, I was thinking of Nightcrawler in X2. That scene is awesome. Nightcrawler in general is awesome, even if he isn’t my favorite X-Man (that would have to be X-23 or sometimes the original Wolverine, depending on how I’m feeling).

As for resurrection, I grew up with Dragon Ball. At some point, you become a bit numb to the idea of resurrection. It was amazing the first time I saw it happen, but now I kind of just expect it if the series has resurrection abilities in it.

I’m not going to make a full response to your post though because I’m a lazy s.o.b. and have more posts to respond to, but I will say I understand what you are saying.

Cheburn wrote:

@Reksew_Trebla Actually, I'm glad you brought Flickering Step to my attention.

Unless this has changed recently, it's a point of some contention (and subject to significant table variance) as to whether Teleportation Mastery (Item Mastery) fulfills the "ability to cast Dimension Door" requirement of Dimensional Agility.

Flickering Step unambiguously grants DD as a SLA, and is designed to allow this exact combo. The feat is particularly biased towards Fighter, because Dimensional X counts a combat feat. This means a Dimensional Assault fighter build can be fully online by level 12 (though it does delay the Advanced Weapon Training you could normally take at level 10), which is not bad, considering. And the only requirement to set up the build is to put skill ranks in Knowledge: Planes.

Still, the number of uses per day is pretty low (2 at level 10, 3 at level 15), and so you're comparing a very limited use ability to casters. If casters start expending limited abilities at high levels, they can do some pretty insane things too. Tricks like Persistent Dazing spells can decimate encounters, and can be pulled off with minimal class investment. That doesn't mention the boatloads of utility and flexibility that casters tend to have compared with martials.

I've got a soft spot for martials, and I'm happy to play them. I'm glad that Fighter in particular has gotten some love from Paizo over the last few years. But I haven't seen anything, including the Dimensional line of feats + Warrior Spirit, that really indicates that an optimized high level martial will outperform an optimized high level caster.

Of course, the "most powerful and versatile class" metric is generally a poor way to choose what classes to play, as it maps very poorly onto enjoyment of a class for most people.

Well, I wasn’t aware there was a controversy there about Teleportation Mastery. To me, it sounds like you are casting it, it’s just you need a “focus” item that meets the prerequisites of the feat. I dunno if that makes sense to you.

MerlinCross wrote:

Reksew_Trebla wrote:

Matthew Downie wrote:

Reksew_Trebla wrote:

Can a caster do something as impressive against the typical group of enemies?

Yes.

And without taking half a dozenfeats to do it.

No they can’t. Prove me wrong.

Time Stop. Summon. Summon. Time Stop again(Debatable if your GM will let you). Summon. Mass buff or Maximized spell of your choice. Time resumes.

Sure your fighter can do damage but suddenly Wizard has an army and maybe buffed. Or the target is debuffed.

I will admit Time Stop is impressive. I thus admit defeat. But to really make summons useful, even if you are summoning an army with Time Stop, you either need to use feats to make them better, or spend more spells for Alter Summoned Monster to make them last longer and get more of the higher level ones by choosing the 1d4+1 option from the list 2 levels lower. Still impressive though, though I don’t think it is the whole “doesn’t have to spend as much to do it” thing.

[MerlinCross]

Time Stop wa just the first thing to pop in my head. Could probably do other things and even with Time stop army could maybe get away without spending as many feats.

But doing so isn't fun to me. Flip side is popping rage into power attack cleave charges is fun but also kinda one shots battles early .

Finally playing a martial but most my characters have been half casters(Alchemist and bards) or support builds(Witch and Shaman)

[Cheburn]

Reksew_Trebla wrote:

Well, I wasn’t aware there was a controversy there about Teleportation Mastery. To me, it sounds like you are casting it, it’s just you need a “focus” item that meets the prerequisites of the feat. I dunno if that makes sense to you.

The multiple interpretations stem from the description in Teleportation Mastery:

Teleportation Mastery (Item Mastery) wrote:

Benefit(s): You can cause an item that has a conjuration spell of 3rd level or higher in its construction requirements to cast dimension door.

Since the feat says "you cause an item to cast dimension door," some people reasonably interpret that as saying that the item is casting, rather than your character.* That then implies that you do not qualify for Dimensional Agility, which has a prerequisite of

Dimensional Agility wrote:

Prerequisites: Ability to use the abundant step class feature or cast dimension door.

rather than "ability to make an item cast dimension door." I don't have a particular interpretation that I support, and there are reasonable arguments for both that I don't want to rehash here -- I think the more restricted is probably most in line with the abilities as they were written, and I don't have a good sense of the "intended" interaction in this case (unlike with Flickering Step, which is unambiguously clear).

If I were running a home table, I'd be likely to allow the more permissive interpretation (Teleportation Mastery qualifies you for Dimensional Agility) because I feel Fighters can use any help they can get at higher levels, but I wouldn't argue with a GM who interpreted it otherwise.

Your interpretation is reasonable, but it's not the only reasonable interpretation. Regardless, the feat combo is definitely subject to table variation (even with well-intentioned GMS who are not biased against martials) at a minimum. Flickering Step should not be.

--
*As an example, if I say, "I made that person sculpt me a replica of Michelangelo's David," I can't really say that I'm the one who sculpted it.

[Ryan Freire]

MerlinCross wrote:

Reksew_Trebla wrote:

Matthew Downie wrote:

Reksew_Trebla wrote:

Can a caster do something as impressive against the typical group of enemies?

Yes.

And without taking half a dozenfeats to do it.

No they can’t. Prove me wrong.

Time Stop. Summon. Summon. Time Stop again(Debatable if your GM will let you). Summon. Mass buff or Maximized spell of your choice. Time resumes.

Sure your fighter can do damage but suddenly Wizard has an army and maybe buffed. Or the target is debuffed.

Either most campaigns end at around level 15/16 OR this is a viable arguement for casters. They cant both be true.

Edit: this is such a common thing that im going to rant about it a little more. Everyone focuses on the 10% of an adventuring career a 9 level caster is a god, and conveniently forgets the 1/3 of a career where a muscle monster farting sideways at them blasts them into unconsciousness.

[MerlinCross]

Ryan Freire wrote:

MerlinCross wrote:

Reksew_Trebla wrote:

Matthew Downie wrote:

Reksew_Trebla wrote:

Can a caster do something as impressive against the typical group of enemies?

Yes.

And without taking half a dozenfeats to do it.

No they can’t. Prove me wrong.

Time Stop. Summon. Summon. Time Stop again(Debatable if your GM will let you). Summon. Mass buff or Maximized spell of your choice. Time resumes.

Sure your fighter can do damage but suddenly Wizard has an army and maybe buffed. Or the target is debuffed.

Either most campaigns end at around level 15/16 OR this is a viable arguement for casters. They cant both be true.

Edit: this is such a common thing that im going to rant about it a little more. Everyone focuses on the 10% of an adventuring career a 9 level caster is a god, and conveniently forgets the 1/3 of a career where a muscle monster farting sideways at them blasts them into unconsciousness.

It's a Wizard. It's always true because they wibbly wobbly did a thing to make it so. Because magic.

As for lowering the level; Maze is funny, Shout would be pretty good if it wasn't Fort based or you have ways of buffing that, Orb of Void can just end some mooks. Or we can scale it back another level and just do Greater Black Tentacles into (Insert Damage AoE here). Or just spam Prismatic Spray into a horde.

Also, I wouldn't say I forgot. I mean, I'm someone that couldn't seem to break the game wide open as a Shaman by book 2 of the AP so I must be doing something wrong according to the community. Meanwhile the Barbarian kills things in one hit(As he does) and just DR's anything he can't turn into chunky sauce in one hit.

Switched to Alchemist. Having more fun as one part buffer, one part switch hitter with Bombs and somewhat homebrewed crossbow.

[OrionTaurus]

Hard to vote when my choice isn’t an option. Give me a spell casting martial any day.