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The problem here is that everyone is comparing apples to oranges.
Fighters are not Paladins.
Nor are they Summoners.
They are not even Barbarians.
Fighters have their own thing that no other class gets. A feat at every level. Feats are powerful. Very powerful, and something that most classes would love more of.
Can Fighters heal? Most likely not, but neither can a handful of other classes.
Can Fighters cast Fly? Same thing as healing, probably not, but many other classes cannot either.
You can always win out on one class over another if you narrow the view to a specific thing.
Fighters are king when it comes to Feats, and because of that, most of the time they are going to be your best front-liner (depends on feat selection of course). Sadly feats typically do not fix the problem of their low out of combat utility.
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...Your BBEG spent 3 rounds casting fireball at a Rogue? I mean, okay.
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The problem here is that everyone is comparing apples to oranges.
Fighters are not Paladins.
Nor are they Summoners.
They are not even Barbarians.Fighters have their own thing that no other class gets. A feat at every level. Feats are powerful. Very powerful, and something that most classes would love more of.
Can Fighters heal? Most likely not, but neither can a handful of other classes.
Can Fighters cast Fly? Same thing as healing, probably not, but many other classes cannot either.
You can always win out on one class over another if you narrow the view to a specific thing.
Fighters are king when it comes to Feats, and because of that, most of the time they are going to be your best front-liner (depends on feat selection of course). Sadly feats typically do not fix the problem of their low out of combat utility.
Feats should not be a decent substitute for actual class features.
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Also, feats suck. There's a reason the only feats my Barbarians ever take are Power Attack and Extra Rage Power.
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I think caster/martial disparity is all in the mind too.
Look, if it were true, *everybody* would be playing casters and nobody would play martial characters and that's simply doesn't happen.
You think that it would at least be more true among veteran players and it is not.
Even among the die-hard min/maxers it's not true. It's not even close.
Trust me, it's all in your head. Now relax and just play the game.
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Feats aren't all that powerful. That's why having them be the fighters main feature isn't a good feature.
And I highly doubt that a fighter is the best front-liner.
Barbs/Paladins/Rangers/Slayers/War Priests/Magus/etc. make better front liners than a fighter.
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I think caster/martial disparity is all in the mind too.
Look, if it were true, *everybody* would be playing casters and nobody would play martial characters and that's simply doesn't happen.
You think that it would at least be more true among veteran players and it is not.
Even among the die-hard min/maxers it's not true. It's not even close.
Trust me, it's all in your head. Now relax and just play the game.
Just because C/MD exists doesn't mean that everyone needs to play wizards. Sometimes you're okay playing something that's suboptimal for theme. Sometimes you want to smash some face. Also if you checked these veterans, how many are playing rogues and fighter vs 6th level casters?
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To each their own.
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Small addendum to the C/M Disparity argument: Barbarians and Paladins are fine. They're pretty well balanced with the 6th level casters, being very strong base line and having interesting utility that makes you consider bringing one instead of a caster. The C/M problem with them is not that Barbs and Paladins are too weak, it's that Wizards and Clerics are too strong.
...Your BBEG spent 3 rounds casting fireball at a Rogue? I mean, okay.
2 rounds, and it was cast at the whole party, but the rogue was able to ignore it. The BBEG was flying above as babau's engaged the party's in melee. She fell to the ground when she took ranged damage and failed her fly check and was then flanked by the rogue and brawler - that's when she used the dimension door wand to move her and the rogue outside and 200 foot up in the air.
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What do martials do that makes a mockery of what casters are capable of?Survive low levels with no need for meat shields.
I have to say, in my experience, casters do this as well or better. There's very little difference between the durability of a 1st level Wizard and a 1st level Fighter, probably none between a Fighter and Cleric (or the Cleric may actually win that one). Parties I've played in with all casters tend to do significantly better than ones containing non-casters.
Keep on being relevant when all spell slots have been expended.
I hear this fairly often, but I feel like there are so many holes in this assertion.
1) Casters are more than just spells. They all have things like Domains, Schools, Mysteries, Revelations, Hexes, etc. that give them options in addition to their spells, and these are generally very viable options at the levels when running out of spells is a real possibility.
2) Most casters have cantrips or spells with long enough durations that can be effective against multiple opponents, or even through multiple engagements. At low levels, a ray of frost with Point Blank Shot deals 1d3+1 and targets touch AC, which will often average out to being just as effective as attacking regular AC with a decent weapon. Daze is an amazing cantrip that completely shuts down many low level opponents for an entire turn. Chill touch is a 1st level spell good against living and undead that gives you a use per level of its ability.
3) Crafting feats are light on prereqs and often given out for free. Wizards get Scribe Scroll for free, and scrolls are so easy to make a Wizard can typically crank out 2 a day during a normal adventuring day without disrupting the flow of the adventure. Scrolls and other consumables that spellcasters can generate allow them to prepare all of their situational and utility spells ahead of time while saving their actual spell slots for combat options and spells that are reliant on maximum DCs and/or caster levels.
4) Are most martial characters really relevant once the spells have been expended? Every single class in the game has at least 1 limited resource they're absolutely reliant on - hit points. Martial characters, outside of the 4 level martial casters, tend to be entirely reliant on casters to renew or protect that resource. Fighting a dragon with a breath weapon? Fighter has crap Reflex, hope the Wizard prepared protection from energy. Rogue just took a crit from enemy mook? Hope the Cleric's there with a cure wounds or some channel energy, otherwise this goes south quick!
5) How can they be relevant after the spells are gone if they weren't relevant before? Before Unchained Monk, we used to joke about the Monk's "Flurry of Misses", because there were so many challenges we'd run into where party Monks would struggle to land more than a couple hits. Typically the only thing that changed that was the Monk getting loaded up with buff spells from the group's casters. When they ran out of spells, his day was effectively over as well.
Granted this kind of situation would not be much fun for those playing casters
I don't think you really mentioned anything that casters can't do as good or better than martials, so I don't know why they wouldn't have fun. And even if I want to hit things with a stick and absorb damage for the group, I'm much better off doing it with one of the partial caster supernatural martials, like the Paladin, or even a 2/3 caster gish class like the Inquisitor whose spells and Judgements can keep him alive for a long time.
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In our last session the brawler, killed a very respectable proportion of the enemies, battered down a barricade, successfully grappled the oracle when she failed a save against domination and dragged her from the room, he held and barred a door, he was able to absorb a lot of damage from the majority of enemies, as well as several poison attacks, whilst effectively defending the spell casters and having a nice role play moment with the BBEG who had been his nemesis.
In the same session but different encounter the party rogue won initiative by a comfortable margin; leapt onto the Demon BBEG's bed ignoring the difficult terrain pillows and silks in between; sneak attacked her before she acted; cast cure serious wounds with a wand twice bringing back the unconscious brawler; avoided all the fireball damage from the BBEG; ignored the sneak damage from two babu then killed one with full attack two weapon sneak damage from flanking; then when dimension door'ed out of the dungeon to 200ft up in the air by the BBEG, disarmed the demon of her wand of dimension door, swallow dived 200ft into a lagoon and then used the wand to dimension door back to the dungeon room.
There is a lack of imagination being displayed by people who claim Martials can only hit things with sticks.
It's not a lack of imagination, it's acceptance of the fact that cool things can really only be done via magic. Which the Rogue in your story there used extensively. Take out all the flowery language and here's what you get:
The Brawler made a successful Grapple check. In any scenario involving something more complicated than a combat, he contributes very, very little.
The Rogue hit a thing with a stick. Then he hit several more things with sticks, an finally he hit a stick with another stick.
The Rogue then used magic to aid the Brawler, got lucky by tanking 16d6+2d3 damage, and used magic to rejoin the party.
These are what the characters actually DID in your description. "Yeah I successfully passed a Fort or Reflex save" is not an action done.
Things can be fun, and exciting, and even meaningful without being any sort of complex contribution. Nobody has disputed that martials can kill things or roll attack rolls.
But they simply cannot contribute to more esoteric plot points. How does the Rogue get you 300 miles to your next destination in a day? How does the Brawler provide a safe place for the party to sleep when they're being scryed on?
They don't. That's the difference, as you have been told before and always seem to ignore.
Martials cannot do certain things casters can. Casters, meanwhile, can do anything a martial can do.
They may not be able to do it as well, but a caster can attempt to Disarm an enemy or full attack it an potentially succeed.
A Brawler, on the other hand, cannot attempt to cast Teleport and have any chance of success without a magic item (made by a caster in the first place).
I don't see wizards chugging up huge quantities of scrolls, no one wants to spend all the wealth on expensive one use items just to get through the day.
They are useful for the circumstantial spells but I don't see people making scrolls of magic missile - quite aside from the fact that you need access to the materials.
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...Your BBEG spent 3 rounds casting fireball at a Rogue? I mean, okay.2 rounds, and it was cast at the whole party, but the rogue was able to ignore it. The BBEG was flying above as babau's engaged the party's in melee. She fell to the ground when she took ranged damage and failed her fly check and was then flanked by the rogue and brawler - that's when she used the dimension door wand to move her and the rogue outside and 200 foot up in the air.
Not to be "that guy", but was your BBEG a succubus? I ask because magical flight doesn't lose altitude from taking damage, so I assume it was a winged opponent.
It also sounds like your Rogue was crazy lucky; those fireballs didn't undo the healing he accomplished with the wand? The enemy didn't make a single AoO and chose to attack the Rogue's strongest defense instead of just grappling him and sucking the life out of him?
I don't doubt the story, I just wonder how else that might have played out if the BBEG had made other choices.
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There are 60 actions listed on the pfsrd with only 7 related to using spells. The list doesn't even include manoeuvres like grappling, tripping, disarming, bull rushing etc.
In our last session the brawler, killed a very respectable proportion of the enemies, battered down a barricade, successfully grappled the oracle when she failed a save against domination and dragged her from the room, he held and barred a door, he was able to absorb a lot of damage from the majority of enemies, as well as several poison attacks, whilst effectively defending the spell casters and having a nice role play moment with the BBEG who had been his nemesis.
In the same session but different encounter the party rogue won initiative by a comfortable margin; leapt onto the Demon BBEG's bed ignoring the difficult terrain pillows and silks in between; sneak attacked her before she acted; cast cure serious wounds with a wand twice - bringing back the unconscious brawler and then the magus; avoided all the fireball damage from the BBEG; ignored the sneak damage from two babu then killed one with full attack two weapon sneak damage from flanking; then when dimension door'ed out of the dungeon to 200ft up in the air by the BBEG, disarmed the demon of her wand of dimension door, swallow dived 200ft into a lagoon and then used the wand to dimension door back to the dungeon room.
There is a lack of imagination being displayed by people who claim Martials can only hit things with sticks.
On the flip side Casters that spend the first few rounds of an encounter casting spells to summon friends or raise their defences are not contributing to combat. When they are finally ready the encounter can be almost finished, then those powers are wasted. The multiple use abilities are generally neglibly effective and are mainly there to stop wizards needing to use crossbows and ruining their wizardly effect. Spell resistance, short ranges, threatening and saving throws can all put reasonable limits on the impact casters have on an encounter.
You forgot the most important information here...what level are these characters, and where's their gear?
Also, why was that oracle dominated instead of the Brawler? Stupid BBEG? GM softballing stuff?
Waht were the level of the foes they were facing?
I mean, sure, everyone gets to shine every once in a while. But you posted examples where the casters were totally useless and the martials all were shining suns. To most of us, that means you've got a game with martial bias and/or don't know how to play casters.
i.e. without knowing your campaign, we're going to say "Well, that's cool, but hardly representative of skilled players using casters."
As for 'wasting the first few rounds', I could say that about Haste. Prayer. Greater Heroism. You know...buff spells for the melees. They 'aren't contributing'. They should be ignoring the melees, dropping summons on the foes, Slow spells, Evard's tentacles, fireballing for 100 hp dmg, walling the enemy in, and so forth.
No more buffing from the casters. It just wastes time, you know!
It's not a lack of imagination, it's acceptance of the fact that cool things can really only be done via magic. Which the Rogue in your story there used extensively. Take out all the flowery language and here's what you get:
The Brawler made a successful Grapple check. In any scenario involving something more complicated than a combat, he contributes very, very little.
The Rogue hit a thing with a stick. Then he hit several more things with sticks, an finally he hit a stick with another stick.
The Rogue then used magic to aid the Brawler, got lucky by tanking 16d6+2d3 damage, and used magic to rejoin the party.
These are what the characters actually DID in your description. "Yeah I successfully...
Lol, well we have very different ideas of what cool is. I know the rogue and brawler players enjoyed it immensely and certainly the party felt the contributed meaningfully. Despite your attempt to dengrate the action - the brawler saved the oracles life by grappling her successfully and dragging her from the room.
As an aside the rogue didn't tank the fall, he successfully dove into water with his acrobatics skill.
As you seem to ignore - requiring the party to travel 300 miles in one day is a adventure design issue not a character issue. I have not seen it needed in any of the two dozen or so published campaigns I have read. The brawler stands watch, that's how he guards the camp site. In 20 years of role playing, and dozens of caster characters, not once have I needed to use mages sanctum to stop scrying - I have literally never ever memorised the spell.
You forgot the most important information here...what level are these characters, and where's their gear?
Also, why was that oracle dominated instead of the Brawler? Stupid BBEG? GM softballing stuff?
Waht were the level of the foes they were facing?
I mean, sure, everyone gets to shine every once in a while. But you posted examples where the casters were totally useless and the martials all were shining suns. To most of us, that means you've got a game with martial bias and/or don't know how to play casters.
i.e. without knowing your campaign, we're going to say "Well, that's cool, but hardly representative of skilled players using casters."
As for 'wasting the first few rounds', I could say that about Haste. Prayer. Greater Heroism. You know...buff spells for the melees. They 'aren't contributing'. They should be ignoring the melees, dropping summons on the foes, Slow spells, Evard's tentacles, fireballing for 100 hp dmg, walling the enemy in, and so forth.
No more buffing from the casters. It just wastes time, you know!
The party was level seven, I won't go through all the gear but it was appropriate for their level.
The BBEG wasn't a succubus it was a half fiend enchanter.
The magus and oracle were certainly not useless, they contributed admirably but I suspect we don't need another paragraph describing how Magus's and Oracles can be useful. Happy to detail if requested.
The gnome oracle was the best looking and therefore a target and had lousy wisdom. The brawler looked like the back of a tractor and was of little use to the BBEG.
Certainly don't have a martial bias, we have a pretty even split between people playing casters and martials. The brawler player usually players wizards and was surprised how much he enjoyed brawler.
I agree with GM1990 - fighters could be better but taking a level of fighter and moving to brawler solves all the problems for me.
...Your BBEG spent 3 rounds casting fireball at a Rogue? I mean, okay.2 rounds, and it was cast at the whole party, but the rogue was able to ignore it. The BBEG was flying above as babau's engaged the party's in melee. She fell to the ground when she took ranged damage and failed her fly check and was then flanked by the rogue and brawler - that's when she used the dimension door wand to move her and the rogue outside and 200 foot up in the air.Not to be "that guy", but was your BBEG a succubus? I ask because magical flight doesn't lose altitude from taking damage, so I assume it was a winged opponent.
...
Should also note it's only a DC 10 to not fall 10 feet, Which barring extraneous circumstances is impossible for a succubus (or almost any flying creature) to fail (+14 fly on a succubus)
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One things that martials do well is deal damage. Sometimes, suddenly having a weak-willed living blender go off while you're standing next to it can be an issue that you just don't have time to react to, especially if you're trying to keep that blender alive while it's killing you.Almost snorted my coffee on this - nice visual.
Thanks :)
I agree with you, (not your exact quote) forum posters tend to be on the fringe of the game regards both enthusiasm and probably system master. One thing that surprised me is the amount of people who responded to my survey that game in a group where they can easily house-rule some of the most basic issues. I would have guessed a lot more people playing at local game shop or PFS based on how some of the threads play out.How and with whom do you game?
Steady group Homebrew or APs: 51
Other 4 categories (PFS, gameshop, online, other systems): 31Which does make me wonder why sometimes there are such strong contentions voiced that Paizo should officially fix/errata somethings. Many of us seem to have already done it, or game where it could be done using existing options others have posted.
I think part of it is that the forums are a relatively skewed sampling most days, particularly in that most people who aren't experiencing a given issue at home probably don't feel the need to weigh in on it, while the people who play in PFS where there's a lot more structure and limitation on on-the-fly adjustments and houserules are going to be more incentivized to weigh in.
I know that I've frequented forums for less than half the time I've played D&D and Pathfinder, and even after I did start I was a lurker for quite a while. If you go back far enough on the Paizo forums, you can even find me arguing that this is a team game and the Fighter is fine!
As I got stronger with the rules, and as my group dynamics shifted to more public and organized play settings, C/MD issues became more and more apparent to me, because they were harder to spot fix while being fair to everyone.
As Paizo released more material, and as I saw more of the high quality 3pp materials out there, I realized that the "team game" excuse didn't hold up as well. The Fighter and Rogue are terrible team players! I'd rather have an Inquisitor and Bard any day of the week. Those are classes that can actually back each other up in a variety of situations, are stronger together than apart, and come together nicely to be much more than the sum of their parts. I like to say that a Bard and an Inquisitor take 1+1 and make it equal 3, while a Fighter and a Wizard take 1+1 and make it equal 1.5. It was discussed earlier how sometimes the best use of a Wizard's spell is buffing the Fighter, which is true, but the other example of a Wizard getting pestered to cast fly on the Fighter so he can actually participate in the fight while the Wizard may want to use his actions for more pressing concerns is also true. There comes a point, often surprisingly early on, where the Fighter, or the Rogue, or the Monk, needs someone to help them do their job, and often that person is also trying to hold up their own piece of things. I prefer it when everyone is capable of doing their job, and getting assistance just makes you even better, rather than having someone who needs assistance just to do their job in the first place.
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level 7, eh.
And a 21k Wand of dimension door as loot? That caught my eye right there.
Sounds like you had a succubus BBEG. Who was played dumb...you got a bunch of people to kill her, and she charms the one with a good Will save and cute instead of the one that could save her life. Remember that high charisma does not mean good looking.
I call it GM softballing, but eh. If it was fun, that's fine, fun is good. But it's a 'my campaign' example for arguing, and so isn't going to have much weight here, Sword.
It's either TOZ or Kirth who likes to say that he didn't believe in the C/M disparity, either...until he got higher level in a campaign with skilled players, and saw it played out repeatedly in front of him, and that creeping feeling of uselessness started.
I will say a brawler should be more useful then a fighter, simply because they can access the combat feats they need 'on demand', and then get rid of the dead weight once done. Normal fighters can't do that. For instance, having Blind fighting can be a life saver in one encounter, and useless 99% of the time. A wizard could just go fishing for Detect Invis. A Brawler can grab it when needed, and ignore it otherwise, devoting her feats to things useful pretty much ALL the time...which is what a fighter is 'limited' to.
Paladins and Rangers can do this versatile thign with spells and better class abilities.
Barbs just get better class abilities, so they are better tanks while being just as good on offense.
Fighters just, eh. DPR.
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Fighters are king when it comes to Feats, and because of that, most of the time they are going to be your best front-liner (depends on feat selection of course). Sadly feats typically do not fix the problem of their low out of combat utility.
To some extent bonus feats can help with it, if you then use some general feats for out of combat abilities. But it is not the best way to go.
Anyway, there are numerous other options: Balanced ability scores, racial abilities, traits, magic items etc.. If you really want a diverse fighter, it's POSSIBLE (and has been done by some players). Just get rid of the idea you have to invest 100% of your resources into martial prowess. You will be FINE with 80%, even with 70%.
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Lol, well we have very different ideas of what cool is. I know the rogue and brawler players enjoyed it immensely and certainly the party felt the contributed meaningfully. Despite your attempt to dengrate the action - the brawler saved the oracles life by grappling her successfully and dragging her from the room.
Cool and highly effective are not the same thing.
My Slayer just critted a Bodak and launched it like 30 feet with a Shield Slam. It was SUPER COOL.
OF course it was one enemy out of a literal army, so not so much impact, but very cool.
As an aside the rogue didn't tank the fall, he successfully dove into water with his acrobatics skill.
That's not how that works, though. A successful Acrobatics check lets you reduce the fall damage by 10 feet. And only if you jump on purpose.
The SRD lists some 3rd party rules that suggest otherwise, but completely ignoring fall damage when you dive into water (and even those rules again only allow it when you CHOOSE to dive, not "are dropped by a flying demon") is not part of the actual Pathfinder ruleset.
So yeah, my bad, if your GM rules he could dive it was ONLY 15d6+2d3.
As you seem to ignore - requiring the party to travel 300 miles in one day is a adventure design issue not a character issue. I have not seen it needed in any of the two dozen or so published campaigns I have read.
Read a little closer. Carrion Crown has a lot of "Need to get here fast" stuff, for example.
There's no explicit time limit, but a lot of APs work on a ticking clock, and if the party takes too long not having everything blow up in their face doesn't make sense any more.
Not to mention any time you need to go back to town to sell and resupply gear in a lot of APs. Serpent's Skull, Skull and Shackles, Kingmaker, etc. are going to end with you waaaay under-geared for your level without a way to quickly travel.
The brawler stands watch, that's how he guards the camp site. In 20 years of role playing, and dozens of caster characters, not once have I needed to use mages sanctum to stop scrying - I have literally never ever memorised the spell.
...Good for you?
You can cry adventure design again if you want, but it' a thing that happens. Explicitly, in at least two APs I know of (Carrion Crown and Rise of the Runelords).
It wasn't a succubus, and the room was not high. I'm aware of the DC and we use the 1 = -10 house rule.
See, this kind of table variance is why people always end up talking past each other. You used two houserules to try and make your point here. Two we know of, anyway.
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Fighters are king when it comes to Feats, and because of that, most of the time they are going to be your best front-liner (depends on feat selection of course). Sadly feats typically do not fix the problem of their low out of combat utility.To some extent bonus feats can help with it, if you then use some general feats for out of combat abilities. But it is not the best way to go.
Anyway, there are numerous other options: Balanced ability scores, racial abilities, traits, magic items etc.. If you really want a diverse fighter, it's POSSIBLE (and has been done by some players). Just get rid of the idea you have to invest 100% of your resources into martial prowess. You will be FINE with 80%, even with 70%.
So let me get this straight. I can go from being 100% combat effective to 80% combat effective to be 60% as Out of Combat effective as a "lets say ranger" who is doing that while being 100% combat effective?
I really don't get why people continuously try and force the fighter to be what it's not to say it's fine. Slayers can do the whole fighty thing like a fighter, but also has a higher baseline for out of combat. Why should I gimp my fighters fighting to still be worse as the slayer at not-fighting?
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If you go back far enough on the Paizo forums, you can even find me arguing that this is a team game and the Fighter is fine!
As I got stronger with the rules, and as my group dynamics shifted to more public and organized play settings, C/MD issues became more and more apparent to me, because they were harder to spot fix while being fair to everyone.
Exact same experience here. Go back far enough (and I've been on the boards for-ev-ar!) and you'll see me making the same "there is no disparity" arguments that people are still repeating ad nauseum. You'll gradually also see me sharing game experiences in which C/MD cropped up and just couldn't be easily fixed on the spot at the table, and which eventually caused us to abandon an AP entirely, because the (3.5e) barbarian was basically sitting out most adventures without getting to do anything. The Alpha PF playtests hit, I still hadn't quite "gotten" it, and I got patiently and very exhaustively schooled by more experienced people.
Now I'm one of the most vehement people around, when it comes to pointing out why there is, indeed, a disparity and why it's bad for the hobby as a whole even if it doesn't affect a particular table.
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Link, Feats provide crap for defensive benefits. Paladins and Barbs are much better front liners because of better saves and DR/Self-healing.
Sword: If you use the 3p Cerulean Seas info, you can dive unharmed into water from 200 feet with a DC 35 acrobatics check (I'd probably use a Swim check myself...). So, it's a GM house rule that you could get away with that with no damage...
Lol, well we have very different ideas of what cool is. I know the rogue and brawler players enjoyed it immensely and certainly the party felt the contributed meaningfully. Despite your attempt to dengrate the action - the brawler saved the oracles life by grappling her successfully and dragging her from the room.
Cool and highly effective are not the same thing.
My Slayer just critted a Bodak and launched it like 30 feet with a Shield Slam. It was SUPER COOL.
OF course it was one enemy out of a literal army, so not so much impact, but very cool.
As an aside the rogue didn't tank the fall, he successfully dove into water with his acrobatics skill.That's not how that works, though. A successful Acrobatics check lets you reduce the fall damage by 10 feet. And only if you jump on purpose.
The SRD lists some 3rd party rules that suggest otherwise, but completely ignoring fall damage when you dive into water (and even those rules again only allow it when you CHOOSE to dive, not "are dropped by a flying demon") is not part of the actual Pathfinder ruleset.
So yeah, my bad, if your GM rules he could dive it was ONLY 15d6+2d3.
As you seem to ignore - requiring the party to travel 300 miles in one day is a adventure design issue not a character issue. I have not seen it needed in any of the two dozen or so published campaigns I have read.Read a little closer. Carrion Crown has a lot of "Need to get here fast" stuff, for example.
There's no explicit time limit, but a lot of APs work on a ticking clock, and if the party takes too long not having everything blow up in their face doesn't make sense any more.
Not to mention any time you need to go back to town to sell and resupply gear in a lot of APs. Serpent's Skull, Skull and Shackles, Kingmaker, etc. are going to end with you waaaay under-geared for your level without a way to quickly travel.
The brawler stands...
Natural 1 = -10 is a fairly common house rule to prevent auto success without breaking credibility. It also hurts skill monkeys much more than casters, so not really relevant to this debate.
As for the soft balling. I added the character in two more times than written in the published encounter. She would join an already written encounter use magic then teleport away. She had the equipment written in the published adventure and followed the tactics written in her stat block - plus a few extra tricks.
I personally do consider attractiveness as a function of charisma if the player chooses it that way. Believe me the half Orc brawler is dog ugly.
The rogue grappled the flying creature and then he chose to break that grapple when it was his turn I therefore considered that the rogue could dive into the water. He wasn't dropped.
I have played Carrion Crown through, we didn't teleport once. I played the caster - a witch - and never even bothered to learn the spell. I can't speak for RotR as I am hoping one day I will get to play in it so haven't read it but it would be the first I have seen that needs teleport.
Having the convenience of being able to teleport to the largest city in the world is not the same as needing to do so. Every AP I have played in had access to large settlements and being able to cherry pick magic items is by no means essential to play an AP.
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It's not a lack of imagination, it's acceptance of the fact that cool things can really only be done via magic. Which the Rogue in your story there used extensively. Take out all the flowery language and here's what you get:
The Brawler made a successful Grapple check. In any scenario involving something more complicated than a combat, he contributes very, very little.
The Rogue hit a thing with a stick. Then he hit several more things with sticks, an finally he hit a stick with another stick.
The Rogue then used magic to aid the Brawler, got lucky by tanking 16d6+2d3 damage, and used magic to rejoin the party.
These are what the characters actually DID in your description. "Yeah I successfully...
Lol, well we have very different ideas of what cool is. I know the rogue and brawler players enjoyed it immensely and certainly the party felt the contributed meaningfully. Despite your attempt to dengrate the action - the brawler saved the oracles life by grappling her successfully and dragging her from the room.
As an aside the rogue didn't tank the fall, he successfully dove into water with his acrobatics skill.
As you seem to ignore - requiring the party to travel 300 miles in one day is a adventure design issue not a character issue. I have not seen it needed in any of the two dozen or so published campaigns I have read. The brawler stands watch, that's how he guards the camp site. In 20 years of role playing, and dozens of caster characters, not once have I needed to use mages sanctum to stop scrying - I have literally never ever memorised the spell.
>As you seem to ignore - requiring the party to travel 300 miles in one day is a adventure design issue not a character issue.
You want to talk adventure design? Let's talk adventure design. As a GM, martials in the party are bloody boring. A party of casters can tackle pretty much any problem you can think of. If they can't do it immediately, they usually can come up with a solution that would work given some preparation time.
Want your BBEG to have their main base of operations in Abyss? Casters can find a way there. Martials need plot devices.
Want to see what would happen if you released a Tarrasque with a SLA Teleport into the world? Casters can fight it. Martials need plot devices/caster help.
Want to build the perfect unassailible fortress possible within the rules and then have the party actually storm it? Casters can do it. Martials die at the entrance.
Want to put the plot device underneath an ocean? Casters can find it, get to it, and bring it to the surface. Martials need caster help or plot devices.
A party of casters can deal with almost any problem you throw at them. Half-android undead demonic dragons riding ninja unicorns? Sure, keep them coming. A giant asteroid is going to impact the capital city in 2 days? They'll have a solution ready by then.
A party of martials? Not very g&#$#%n likely. What sorts of epic problems can a party of fighters deal with? I'll leave this as an exercise to the reader.
By "martials" here I mean all non-casters, as well as 4-level casters(ranger, paladin) to a lesser extent. Rangers, Paladins and Barbarians are usually considered the "good" martials because they have meaningful abilities that can make them useful to the party at all times, or at the very least not a drain on the party's resources. E.g. if party needs to go into a volcano, Ranger can cast Communal Resist Energy and save the wizard some slots, and then also be pretty damn good at combat. Fighter? Fighter can only fight. Badly at that.
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The rogue grappled the flying creature and then he chose to break that grapple when it was his turn I therefore considered that the rogue could dive into the water. He wasn't dropped.
Cool. So he should have eaten somewhere along the lines of damage, and been in pretty bad shape, if not unconscious (and therefore dead, since characters at -1 HP or lower who are underwater drown at the start of the next turn).
Now, if you were using those 3pp rules...great. They're pretty neat rules, and make skills actually able to do some kind of epic things you see in movies and such.
But that's YOU throwing the Rogue a bone, not the system being designed well for it.
I don't find that to be the case. Our low magic Pathfinder conversion of The Enemy Within was probably my most satisfying DM experience ever. To each their own. The closest we got to a caster in that campaign was when the half elf swashbuckler took a 1 level dip into bard.
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So if the GM house rules that Martials can do more than the rules say they can then the Martials are able to perform more things! Wow, this is truly revolutionary.
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There are no pathfinder rules for diving into water - the pfsrd has some helpful suggestions - really not sure what the problem is. I could have let the rogue take the 60 odd points of damage he would have survived but why.
People seem to be forgetting the the role of the DM. To referee the game and adjudicate situations like this. If you think hitting water is the same as hitting rock and rule it that way then fine but you have no more justification for that then I have for allowing the dive.
For the record: the rules are a guide for setting difficulty and adjudicating outcomes not an exhaustive list of every possible action and its outcome.
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No need to be snide. As long as they had fun, compliment him on a fun campaign, but just note that it doesn't hold for a campaign by the rules, which is the default on this forum.
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There are no pathfinder rules for diving into water - the pfsrd has some helpful suggestions - really not sure what the problem is. I could have let the rogue take the 60 odd points of damage he would have survived but why.
People seem to be forgetting the the role of the DM. To referee the game and adjudicate situations like this. If you think hitting water is the same as hitting rock and rule it that way then fine but you have no more justification for that then I have for allowing the dive.
I think the problem is that you're propping up an anecdote where you purposefully circumvent the system as evidence against flaws in said system.
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I mean, from that height hitting water IS basically the same as hitting rock, but real world physics aren't the issue here.
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I'm confused about these diving comments
Falling into Water: Falls into water are handled somewhat differently. If the water is at least 10 feet deep, the first 20 feet of falling do no damage. The next 20 feet do nonlethal damage (1d3 per 10-foot increment). Beyond that, falling damage is lethal damage (1d6 per additional 10-foot increment).
Characters who deliberately dive into water take no damage on a successful DC 15 Swim check or DC 15 Acrobatics check, so long as the water is at least 10 feet deep for every 30 feet fallen. The DC of the check, however, increases by 5 for every 50 feet of the dive.
200 feet means a DC35 Acrobatics or swim check to avoid all damage, and would be possible if the water was at minimum 70 feet deep.
Otherwise the damage would be 2d3 (Nonleathal) + 16d6 (Lethal)
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Those diving rules are 3party, from Cerulean Seas, Fire.
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Falling into Water: Falls into water are handled somewhat differently. If the water is at least 10 feet deep, the first 20 feet of falling do no damage. The next 20 feet do nonlethal damage (1d3 per 10-foot increment). Beyond that, falling damage is lethal damage (1d6 per additional 10-foot increment).
Characters who deliberately dive into water take no damage on a successful DC 15 Swim check or DC 15 Acrobatics check, so long as the water is at least 10 feet deep for every 30 feet fallen. The DC of the check, however, increases by 5 for every 50 feet of the dive.
EDIT:link to prd
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Those diving rules are 3party, from Cerulean Seas, Fire.
I disagree They are on the PRD
I mean, from that height hitting water IS basically the same as hitting rock, but real world physics aren't the issue here.
The record is 193 feet but I guess this fantasy so the 7 feet difference does make it ridiculous.
Thanks fire warrior - I guess there are rules.
This exemplifies one of my issues with this discussion. The near comprehensive nature of the pathfinder rules mean that some people approach the game in the spirit that if the rules don't explicitly allow it, it can't be done. Rather than players determining action and the DM applying the appropriate rule or adjudicating if there isn't a rule.
There are no rules for jumping from one horse to another - knocking the opponent off the horse as you do so.
There are no rules for pushing someone out of a window.
There are no rules for sliding down stairs on a shield.
There are no rules for slamming a door shut and then two people holding it shut.
However all these things can be adjudicated by a reasonable DM. However I get that some DMs are not reasonable and therefore any action that isn't guaranteed in all cases (look see it's in the rules pg xxx) gets pooh poohed.
Spells on the other hand have very specifc outcomes and there are thousands therefore it seems there are more options. Yes some of these are fantastic but a caster pays a price for that fantastic power. There is still the whole gamut of mundane but feasible actions one can take beyond hitting things with sticks.
This is exacerbated by Paizo with the endless quest for more feats and archetypes. Now attempting to cast a spell discreetly or persuade someone to do something with a particular skill requires a feat. Until that point the DM made their own judgement.
This is why I say the downer on martial is a problem of imagination.
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I think caster/martial disparity is all in the mind too.
Good on you. I think it's a real and measurable result of imbalances within the core system, one which I've experienced and developed an opinion and understanding of through years of play at multiple tables.
Look, if it were true, *everybody* would be playing casters and nobody would play martial characters and that's simply doesn't happen.
False conclusion. I occasionally play Fighters knowing full well I'm hamstringing myself. Sometimes I do it because I want to play on "hard mode". Sometimes I do it because I'm playing with a new group and want to get a feel for how they run their games. Sometimes I do it because I had 5 minutes to make a character and I knew we'd never go past 3rd level anyways. The fact that people still play a class that has a way lower ceiling doesn't mean it doesn't have a way lower ceiling.
I know a millionaire who lives in the house his dad built and drives an '89 Subaru. He could afford a better car and house, but he's comfortable where he is. Same principle can apply to game classes.
You think that it would at least be more true among veteran players and it is not.
See above.
Even among the die-hard min/maxers it's not true. It's not even close.
See above.
Trust me, it's all in your head. Now relax and just play the game.
Because so many people are routinely convinced to change their minds because someone who contributed nothing but off-handed dismissals and unfounded conclusions condescendingly told them they're crazy.
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Anything a martial can do a non-martial can do as well. So if your fix for the martial is pushing someone out of a window, jumping from one horse to another - knocking the opponent off the horse as you do so, or slamming a door shut and holding it shut because you're imaginative actually doesn't fix the marital, as the casters can do those things too. So imagination is a player skill, but is limited to the options the class provides. Base fighters have the least options, anything they can do, any other class can do too, sometimes/often better. Plus those other classes have more things you can use your imagination on to do even cooler things.
Casters can attempt them but won't be as good as a martial if they don't have the BAB, strength or skills to do these things and the DM uses those very reasonable stats as the base for adjudicating those actions.
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right, because my Clerics, War Priests, Paladins, Rangers, Bloodragers, Bards, Skalds, alchemists, investigators, Hunters, Occultists, Mediums, etc... can't have as good a STR as a fighter. Nor can the Magus, alchemists, investigators, wizards, sorcerers, etc. have as good a dex as the rogue. Nor can any of these classes invest in as many skills as the fighter can.
BAB is the one thing that not all can replicate, so some of these classes would have a -1 per 4 levels to those checks. But hey, if the DM is making up the DC's on the fly, why not lower it some to make it just as likely? I mean he's already just saying you need to roll a 7 or higher anyways if he's going off BAB.
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Casters can attempt them but won't be as good as a martial if they don't have the BAB, strength or skills to do these things and the DM uses those very reasonable stats as the base for adjudicating those actions.
But if my caster wants full BAB, I can cast transformation, or righteous might, and I have it. I can get a whopping strength score from buff spells and polymorphing or wildshaping or divine power or whatever. My bard or wizard is going to have far more skill ranks then anyone but the rogue, and maybe even him. If I want my caster to be physical guy - it is usually a spell or two away. If I want my physical guy to be a caster... UMD is as close as I can get.
In the last campaign I played in, my wimpy elf cleric was the best at combat maneuvers, despite his weak strength and 3/4 BAB. Why? Because all he had to do to get a +20 bonus was cast a 1st level domain spell - true strike.