Spellcasters and their problems ...

[orphias]

Probably my biggest gripe is that they are consistently several levels behind the curve with their attacks rolls. When they are trained every other class is master for at least 2-3 levels. The wizard in my group has got to the point where he is considering re-rolling a fighter as he sometimes goes through an encounter without hitting anything ! and the cleric has turned into a healbot and just leaves the fighting to the barbarian and ranger.

My second gripe on casters is where martial classes get magic weapons to increase their hit chances and are doing significantly more damage than the poor wizard ever does. Even breaking out a fireball can be just plain embarressing. Last game he hurled a fireball for 14 damage, all the enemies saved but one ( because the DCs for casters suck LOL) so they took a whopping 7 dmg ! :( So much for the spellblaster, seems a thing of the past that's for sure.

Has anyone had any success or have some pointers for my wizard, because I can't see him playing the class much longer ? ...

[thenobledrake]

They may be behind on the bonus they add to an attack roll or the DC of their save, but that's not the only part of the equation of what would be balanced. They get more on the other side of the equation, so it's absolutely fair as-is.

Of course, some players have a perception issue wherein they view "my enemy succeeded at their save" as equal to "my character failed" when the reality is that casters regularly get the equivalent of a potent "effect on a failure" mechanic because it takes a critical success on a save for an opponent to actually not have something bad happen to them.

And look at that, gripe two is actually just gripe one repeated.

Let's look at this fireball "sucked" situation: a roll of 14 is bad. There's only a 2.49% chance of rolling 14 when casting fireball as a 3rd-level spell. Definitely don't hold a roll that the player had a 93.92% chance of rolling better than up as if it will be the typical result of the spell.

But still, all the enemies saved but one, so we are looking at a total damage dealt "while failing" of 21, 28, 35, or 42 if there were 2, 3, 4, or 5 enemies. Compare that to what a 5th-level martial can do if the dice go against them and their attacks all miss (which is actually a lot more likely because fireball is like a much-higher level martial feat in that it doesn't get an increased chance of failure for each target after the first).

So perception-wise the player feels like they threw a fireball and "it sucked" but objective reality says the character did as well failing as a martial character of the same level could do succeeding. Pointer-wise you could put this information in front of the player... but people tend not to be open to changing the way they are looking at something, so I'd just expect the player to want to change characters soon because caster isn't for them (and then probably still think their character sucks because a focus on the negative tends to be a sticky trait that doesn't just go away because the person with it gets to add a slightly higher number to a die roll).

[MEATSHED]

Do you mean crit saved? Fireball does half damage on a normal save and full damage on a failed one.
In addition, only fighters have master weapon proficiency when wizards have trained spell casting, every other martial class is expert.

[thenobledrake]

And speaking of fighters: if being a couple points behind on attack bonus actually meant a class was gripe-worthy, only fighters wouldn't be.

[Samurai]

I have 2 options for you:

1) Allow characters to Dual-class, from the GMG. If the caster is also a martial class, he could use whichever option is better at the time. Maybe start with a spell or two and then switch to weapon attacks afterwards.

2) Use or create some house rules to improve spellcasting. Reducing the casting time for most spells by -1 action in exchange for adding the Flourish trait, or offering more ways to use meta-magic (being able to spend either an action or their reaction, for instance), or offering other options to sustain a spell. You could also alter some spell's effects for more targeted changes, if you want.

[SuperBidi]

orphias wrote:

My second gripe on casters is where martial classes get magic weapons to increase their hit chances and are doing significantly more damage than the poor wizard ever does.

At low level. At high level, casters easily outdamage martials. Casters are weak at level 1-4, and a bit under martials at level 5-6. After that, it's just bliss.

[Ubertron_X]

Well there certainly are two issues.

First one is attack spell accuracy, which definitely is behind martials for most of the early levels, as martials have easier access to better proficiency, magic runes and personal cicrumstance bonuses (e.g. flanking), which at certain critical levels (looking at you level 5) can easily amount to a 5 to 7 points disadvantage. Haven't seen it in actual play yet (our party is also still low level), however general forum tenor is that things ought to get better once your proficiency levels catch up (level 7+) and low level spell slots are abundant and can easily be expanded for accuracy enhancers like True Strike. So the general recommendation is to always use True Strike every time you cast any significant non-cantrip spell attack spell and to avoid high AC targets (higher level creatures and bosses).

Note that accuracy issues might easily also be dependent on party synergy because in contrast to the rather personal flanking bonus, debuffs like prone, grabbed or frightened really are for everyone.

Second there is this thing about failure effects, which truely are are thing in PF2. As @thenobledrake already mentioned this is mostly a perception issue as many player still go by a "save" equals bad, "no save" equals good attitude. However as much as I like that PF2's spell failure effects try to compensate bad results while spending limited ressources - in contrast to martials that have an endless supply of attacks even if they fail horribly in any given round - many people (including myself) really struggle to come to grips with non-damaging failure effects as (historically) spells have been and are still usually cast for effect, not any failure effects.

[Henro]

In my experience casters early on (levels 1-4) can be a bit rough, reasons being;
-They are bad at damage. Don't pursue damage as a low level caster or you will end up very sad.
-They are squishy as hell, a lot of the time. There are exceptions to this, but early on casters do suffer from their lack of bulk and defense. Later, you will have a lot of magical tools to mitigate this though you never completely get away from it.
-Level 2 spells have some great ones, but for some lists it's nearly a dead level. Level 2 spells are complete garbage for the divine list, for example (Blood Vendetta is an amazing spell, but at that level it's too resource intensive). Level 3+ spells is when magic really starts to shine for a lot of lists.

I think there are great benefits to early casters though - a lot of level 1 and 2 spells are genuinely an amazing asset when used in the right situation (invisibility as an out-of-combat tool, early debuffs like grease, fear and hideous laughter vs bosses, magic weapon is actually just broken at level 1). And the lists that end up suffering more early usually offer some good benefits in the class itself, clerics with Font for example.

[The Wibble]

From my experience playing through the adventure paths, I think part of the problem is that spells are going against the same saves that skill actions use, and any character can have a much higher proficiency in a skill than casters can have in casting spells (until high levels), plus you can get weapon enhancements and some class feats to boost those skill rolls even more, which you can't do with spells.

This means that monster saves have to be high enough that a character can't just use trip, grapple, intimidate
and other skill actions make encounters trivial, but by doing this spells struggle to get through and you end up with casters having a disappointing feal.

Getting a failure with a spell even if it does something doesn't feel fun, and realising that you will basically never get the cool critical effect that you picked the spell for is even more disappointing.

[thenobledrake]

The Wibble wrote:

Getting a failure with a spell even if it does something doesn't feel fun

It is very strange to me how many people say this.

Like, "oh, I only dazzled the monster for a round" or "ah man, the target is frightened 1... lame" or "shucks, I stunned the target." are actually so reasonable to say that it's a problem with the game and not a problem with the player's expectations.

Basically, it kinda sounds equivalent to a player being bummed out when their martial character doesn't one-shot an enemy with a Strike. Yeah, the player's not having fun - but no way is that actually because the game isn't working just fine.

[Charlie Brooks]

I've found spellcasters to be pretty effective overall. The example of a fireball only doing 7 damage to a group is a pain, but an extreme circumstance that combines a poor damage roll with several good saves.

As in the previous edition, spellcasters benefit most if they can identify things about their enemies. Figuring out an energy weakness or a low save gives them a major advantage. Recall Knowledge is a good use of an action early on in battle.

It's also worth holding a few spells that have guaranteed effects. Magic missile may not seem to be worth heightening on paper, but it's nice to be able to pepper a foe for 20 points of guaranteed damage in a pinch.

Finally, remember that some creatures have really good saves, usually because they had spell resistance in 1st edition. Trying to zap a whole group of demons is going to be rough at times.

Overall, in my Age of Ashes group that has a wizard, a sorcerer, and a cleric, the melee fighters are dominating in the single-target damage area, but the spellcasters can mop up groups like nobody's business.

[gesalt]

There's a distinct difference in knowing you're contributing mathematically by healing your melee for dozens of hp after they get crit or with giving an enemy -1 to everything for a turn, and feeling bored playing a healbot or pressing fear every turn.

[Ubertron_X]

thenobledrake wrote:

The Wibble wrote:

Getting a failure with a spell even if it does something doesn't feel fun

It is very strange to me how many people say this.

Like, "oh, I only dazzled the monster for a round" or "ah man, the target is frightened 1... lame" or "shucks, I stunned the target." are actually so reasonable to say that it's a problem with the game and not a problem with the player's expectations.

Basically, it kinda sounds equivalent to a player being bummed out when their martial character doesn't one-shot an enemy with a Strike. Yeah, the player's not having fun - but no way is that actually because the game isn't working just fine.

The problem is that apart from raw damage on a failed save other effects can often either a) not been perceived as effective as easily as damage is and/or b) may very much be dependent on timing.

Frightend 1 on a monster that is right behind you in initiative and whose plan was to anyway move and cast a defensive or buff spell may just be lost. A dazzled condition on a monster that makes it's one to three flat checks or just uses an area attack has suddenly achieved nothing etc.

Don't get me wrong, I am not arguing against math and statistics (because that would be stupid), which means that long term all those little benefits of failed spells will sooner or later come into effect. The thing is that our brains seem to remember bad things better than good ones, so I can probably tell you more stories about how many attackes passed my Warpriests failed Dazzling Flash than how many attacks have actually been stopped by it.

Damage from a failed fireball however will always come into effect, both ingame and in most players perception.

[thenobledrake]

gesalt wrote:

There's a distinct difference in knowing you're contributing mathematically by healing your melee for dozens of hp after they get crit or with giving an enemy -1 to everything for a turn, and feeling bored playing a healbot or pressing fear every turn.

If a person can't reconcile knowing they are helping and having fun, they are playing the wrong character. It's not that their character isn't actually fun - it's that their fun hinges on something other than what the class is designed to provide.

No point eating meat if you don't like the way it tastes.

Ubertron_X wrote:

The problem is... <snipped for space>

I understand that a lot of people get hung up on the negative just as you say. But I also know that people are capable of deliberately changing their focus when they are motivated to do so - and generally, having a good time is enough motivation for many people.

Just like people can stop themselves from saying "[thing they don't like] is garbage" and instead say "[thing they don't like] is not for me", which is the same opinion just without the fight-starting connotation to it, people can teach themselves to remember that "bad rolls" exist because they are necessary in order for their to be any "good rolls" and focus on the positives rather than the negatives.

Basically, if you go into a situation looking to have a good time you probably will - but if you go into a situation ready for so much as a short string of rolls not going in your favor to spoil your time you will probably have a bad time. (So sayeth the man that rolled a natural 1 on his first spell attack roll with a spell he really wanted to land, spent a hero point to re-roll and rolled a second natural 1, then his character got grabbed by an owlbear and almost died, but had a great time because I chose to laugh at my outlandish bad luck rather than try to blame cooler stuff not happening on something like "ray of enfeeblement is a bad spell" or "monster attack bonuses are too high.")

[Salamileg]

thenobledrake wrote:

The Wibble wrote:

Getting a failure with a spell even if it does something doesn't feel fun

It is very strange to me how many people say this.

Like, "oh, I only dazzled the monster for a round" or "ah man, the target is frightened 1... lame" or "shucks, I stunned the target." are actually so reasonable to say that it's a problem with the game and not a problem with the player's expectations.

Basically, it kinda sounds equivalent to a player being bummed out when their martial character doesn't one-shot an enemy with a Strike. Yeah, the player's not having fun - but no way is that actually because the game isn't working just fine.

The wizard I GM for said something similar in a boss fight against an APL+3 enemy, "As long as he doesn't critically succeed I'm doing my job right." And I think that's a good mentality to have.

In fact, in that fight, the three casters in the party did 100% of the damage. The barbarian never managed to hit once (and the boss crit saved against her breath weapon) even after being Hasted by the wizard. But the barbarian knows that it came down to poor dice luck, and didn't blame the system for it.

[Lycar]

orphias wrote:

Probably my biggest gripe is that they are consistently several levels behind the curve with their attacks rolls.

"My biggest gripe is, that classes, whose job is not hitting things with other things, are worse at hitting things with other things, then the classes whose job it is to hit things with other things."

There, that is what you just said, only worded differently. Or let's turn that around:

"My biggest gripe is, that martial classes don't get to tell reality to shut up and sit down the way caster classes do."

orphias wrote:

My second gripe on casters is where martial classes get magic weapons to increase their hit chances and are doing significantly more damage than the poor wizard ever does.

The 'poor Wizard' gets to tell reality to shut up and sit down.

The martials get to do substantial amounts of damage to single targets.

The martials do not get to tell reality to shut up and sit down.

The 'poor Wizard' does not get to do substantial amounts of damage to single targets... At low levels. But at higher spell levels, True Strike Desintrgrate is a thing, and even at middling levels, casters can deal substantial area effect damage.

Which, by the way, martials still can't. Soo... yeah, 'poor Wizard' my left toe. :p

If a player wants to do massive single-target damage, Giant Totem Barbarian is pretty good I hear...

[Ubertron_X]

Lycar wrote:

...lots of yadda yadda...

Please tell me again how simply wanting to be able to hit a Ray of Enfeeblement or similar is about outdealing martials at single target damage...

[Darksol the Painbringer]

orphias wrote:

Probably my biggest gripe is that they are consistently several levels behind the curve with their attacks rolls. When they are trained every other class is master for at least 2-3 levels. The wizard in my group has got to the point where he is considering re-rolling a fighter as he sometimes goes through an encounter without hitting anything ! and the cleric has turned into a healbot and just leaves the fighting to the barbarian and ranger.

My second gripe on casters is where martial classes get magic weapons to increase their hit chances and are doing significantly more damage than the poor wizard ever does. Even breaking out a fireball can be just plain embarressing. Last game he hurled a fireball for 14 damage, all the enemies saved but one ( because the DCs for casters suck LOL) so they took a whopping 7 dmg ! :( So much for the spellblaster, seems a thing of the past that's for sure.

Has anyone had any success or have some pointers for my wizard, because I can't see him playing the class much longer ? ...

I can agree that blasting spells are underwhelming and behind the curve. That being said, they are hardly horrible, and if used appropriately, can absolutely devastate encounters.

For your Fireball example at 3rd level, it is an average of 21 damage, with a minimum of 6 and a maximum of 36. The player rolled quite below average on damage and was using a spell that is both hingent on enemies with weaker Reflex saves and having Fire weaknesses (or at least, no fire resistance/immunity). Based on the fact that most enemies made their Saves, they could have just rolled really well or had very high Reflex Saves for their level, making it harder to fail against that kind of spell. It also depends on how many enemies you are targeting; usually, if you have 3+ enemies to target, the blasting spell pulls ahead of any given martial's turn, unless they got crazy Whirlwind Attack abilities. The more the better. Otherwise, single target damage spells (like Phantasmal Killer) or cantrips (Electric Arc and Ray of Frost/Telekinetic Projectile in particular) would be wiser spell choices in situations where you can only get 1 or 2 enemies.

A good example of using the right spell would be when a large amount of reinforcements appear on the battlefield and you need to level that playing field fast. I had such an occurrence, and utilized the spell Chain Lightning against them. It only has a range of 30 feet, but between the tethers and enemy types (Reflex Saves were their weakest stat), plus rolling decent on the damage (I believe I had 65 or so damage per target on 8D12, minimum 8, maximum 96, average 52), made the current encounter plus the reinforcements decimated and much easier for my party members to clean up. With 1 save, 5 failures, and 1 critical failure, I did over 400 points of damage with a single spell.

Of course, this is against equal or lower level enemies of a plentiful quantity. The worst outcome was with both a Slow and a Phantasmal Killer combo on a caster boss, which did absolutely nothing due to the back to back Critical Saves (both were Natural 20's; but even on successes, they wouldn't be extremely effective, 4d8 plus frightened and slowed 1 for a round is better than nothing, but by no means gamechanging).

This all occurred at the same session at 11th level, part of the Age of Ashes AP. You will have moments where you shine and moments where you flat out suck. That's just the nature of the game. Play to your strengths, flush out and eliminate your weaknesses, and you'll have a better time playing your character.

[Deriven Firelion]

orphias wrote:

Probably my biggest gripe is that they are consistently several levels behind the curve with their attacks rolls. When they are trained every other class is master for at least 2-3 levels. The wizard in my group has got to the point where he is considering re-rolling a fighter as he sometimes goes through an encounter without hitting anything ! and the cleric has turned into a healbot and just leaves the fighting to the barbarian and ranger.

My second gripe on casters is where martial classes get magic weapons to increase their hit chances and are doing significantly more damage than the poor wizard ever does. Even breaking out a fireball can be just plain embarressing. Last game he hurled a fireball for 14 damage, all the enemies saved but one ( because the DCs for casters suck LOL) so they took a whopping 7 dmg ! :( So much for the spellblaster, seems a thing of the past that's for sure.

Has anyone had any success or have some pointers for my wizard, because I can't see him playing the class much longer ? ...

I went through this same process. I learned I was wrong and that casters do hellacious damage and effects.

1. Hit rolls are low. I would like to see a magic item to boost spell hit rules, for those spells that require hit rolls.

2. Casters can attack different saves in a way martials cannot. This isn't as obvious at low level, but it becomes very obvious at high level.

3. Martials are better at single target damage and should be. That being said spell crits are a thing and if you get a spell crit on a powerful single target spell, you will be surprised at the damage. I had an enemy crit fail on a tempest surge save and did 10d12 damage. Unfortunately I rolled low and did 38 damage. But the potential was there.

3. Your AoE damage will reach quite insane levels at higher level. My bard has had AoE rounds easily in the 300 plus damage range multiple times. Critical fails on AOE saves do insane damage. It gets more insane as you get higher level spells.

My druid regularly beats the entire group on damage with a barbarian, swashbuckler, and precision ranger using fireball, animal companion, focus spell, and bow.

4. Your riders get to be quite powerful even on successful saving throws. Phantasmal Killer has no incapacitation and is frightened 1 on a success. On a critical fail you have a chance to either kill the target which has incapacitation or they are frightened 4 and fleeing, which is pretty much a game over scenario for them.

5. Even your players will learn to fear casters more than martials because getting smashed a bunch of times by AoE damage is the surest way to party death as it pressures the entire group's hit point pool. It can get insanely nasty if you have fails and crit fails. My bard took 130 points of damage from a lvl 8 fireball critical fail. That is not fun.

6. Don't overlook magic items like wands and scrolls. They use the same DC and attack rolls as all your spells.

If your player can tough out those weak low levels and time his opportunities well, he will not be disappointed by his damage as he rises in level, though single target will never be his best damage though he will surprise even on single target sometimes.

[Deriven Firelion]

On getting flat-footed.

1. Remember 4th level invis works while using hostile actions. Many creatures cannot see through invisibility until much higher level. Even then they still have to make a counteract check to breach your invis against your spell DC. Which means at higher level, many lower level true seeing creatures will likely not even breach your 4th level greater invis. You can hit them flat-footed while invis.

2. At the highest level you can get mind blank. A 24 hour buff that has a good chance of countering many divinations. You can flat-foot targets easily casting invis with mind flank on.

It's not as hard for higher level casters to flat-foot targets.

[Ubertron_X]

Deriven Firelion wrote:

5. Even your players will learn to fear casters more than martials because getting smashed a bunch of times by AoE damage is the surest way to party death as it pressures the entire group's hit point pool. It can get insanely nasty if you have fails and crit fails. My bard took 130 points of damage from a lvl 8 fireball critical fail. That is not fun.

The problem is not the spells they bring but their inflated DCs. Many enemy casters outlevel and outproficency the groups casters, which can indeed lead to devastating AoEs.

[Deriven Firelion]

Ubertron_X wrote:

Deriven Firelion wrote:

5. Even your players will learn to fear casters more than martials because getting smashed a bunch of times by AoE damage is the surest way to party death as it pressures the entire group's hit point pool. It can get insanely nasty if you have fails and crit fails. My bard took 130 points of damage from a lvl 8 fireball critical fail. That is not fun.

The problem is not the spells they bring but their inflated DCs. Many enemy casters outlevel and outproficency the groups casters, which can indeed lead to devastating AoEs.

Your party casters start to do exactly the same thing, especially when taking into account negative modifiers. It gets even worse.

If you hit a monster with Synesthesia and it is affect for even one round, then follow it up with a reflex save spell that creature is -3 on its reflex saves.

And mooks at high level once you hit that Master save at 15 are really at a disadvantage on saves.

Both sides start to have high DCs. Not necessarily super boss guy, but definitely at level opponents.

My group at lvl 15 is straight crushing martial enemies. Caster enemies not so much. The group casters are more formidable in combat dropping some crazy AoE damage or shifting ACs and probabilities far more than the martials. The cleric can pretty much erase martial damage at this point.

It is the party casters that have pretty much made the chances of the party failing almost negligible at lvl 15 and up.

[Fangtasmagoria]

I agree with the general sentiment, if the class is not for you then it's not for you. My group is well into a PF2 campaign and in the beginning my caster didn't feel all that hot. Now at 8th level my Cleric who is geared to healing can out damage the melee characters when I cast an offensive spell. Additionally, in the three action economy any spell that costs some of the nastier enemies we have faced a single action have saved our bacon more times than I can count.

That said RPGs are very much about feel for some players and no amount of data or anecdotes will change some folks love or dislike of a class if they aren't feeling it.

[Midnightoker]

Spell attack roll spells are in a bad spot but saves are probably fine. Save targeting nets you awesome benefits and success effects still matter.

Spell attack rolls cost generally two actions, do nothing on failure, don’t get runes like Weapons, and are generally behind in progression the entire game (sometimes by absolutely daunting numbers as pointed out above).

Now there aren’t a lot of Spell attack roll spells outside of cantrips at the moment, so I don’t think it’s super obvious, but they are substantially weaker just by having to go against AC with no weapon runes (which are accounted for in creature AC) and no failure effect. In the Playtest, touch ac was still a thing, but not so anymore.

[Fumarole]

Quote:

A good example of using the right spell would be when a large amount of reinforcements appear on the battlefield and you need to level that playing field fast. I had such an occurrence, and utilized the spell Chain Lightning against them. It only has a range of 30 feet, but between the tethers and enemy types (Reflex Saves were their weakest stat), plus rolling decent on the damage (I believe I had 65 or so damage per target on 8D12, minimum 8, maximum 96, average 52), made the current encounter plus the reinforcements decimated and much easier for my party members to clean up. With 1 save, 5 failures, and 1 critical failure, I did over 400 points of damage with a single spell.

Impressive, but you should note that for chain lightning the damage is only rolled once, then the basic reflex save results are applied individually. Also its range is 500' with 30' jumps.

[Palinurus]

Deriven Firelion wrote:

...

Agree completely. I think boosting hit rolls is tricky because stacking a boost with true strike could be OP, but there's probably a neat solution that prevents this.

In Age of Ashes (which is pretty brutal for casters - at least early on) only the Bard and Wizard have been able to outright wreck encounters (at least from mid levels). Phantasmal Killer has outright killed at least three enemies and 4th level Sleep from the Enchanter often removes 1-2 foes from the encounter. Synesthesia is just brutal as a debuff.

Clever uses of spells like Command, Resilient Sphere or Illusory Creature also change encounter difficulty dramatically. Blasting is very powerful against multiple targets or targets with weak reflex saves. It has taken a while to get used to 2e spells - initially I struggled with spell choice and overlooked spells that I would never have picked in 1e or that had incapacitation. Once I got past that it has been much more interesting and effective.

[gnoams]

My first game caster experience was hitting a pair of zombies with burning hands, they both roll nat 1s! Woo, double crits, neither of them drop though. Then a martial character walks over to two fresh zombies, hits each of them and drops them in one swing each, with just normal hits. Yaaay, spellcasting is so awesome.

A lot of people tout that spells do something on a miss. Yeah, some do. Not ones with attack rolls though, they're just like a martial swinging a sword, except they take 2 actions instead of one, have less chance to hit, and do less than 2 attacks from said martial. You could cast shocking grasp for 2 actions to deal 2d12 on a hit. Or you could swing a greatsword, targeting the same defense, using only one action, for 1d12+something, and do that twice.

True strike fixes things? That's nice, what about the other two spell lists?

Casters can target different defenses? Well, sort of. If a horde of goblins is charging you, you want to burning hands the lot of them, not fear one. You will usually choose the spell you cast in a situation based on what it does, not which defense it targets. You might have spells that target every different defense, but they're useful in different situations, not interchangeable.

Things do get better as you gain levels and options. I find casters start way worse off though, and it makes them not fun to have to suffer through so much failure before you get to be adequate.

[thenobledrake]

gnoams wrote:

My first game caster experience was hitting a pair of zombies with burning hands, they both roll nat 1s! Woo, double crits, neither of them drop though. Then a martial character walks over to two fresh zombies, hits each of them and drops them in one swing each, with just normal hits. Yaaay, spellcasting is so awesome.

...in Pathfinder 2nd edition, or what? Because if this is a PF2 experience you're recounting, it feels like there are some important details missing as the caster part seems to check out but the martial character part is stretching the definition of "just normal hits" or is talking about a very specific martial character that had more set-up than indicated.

gnoams wrote:

A lot of people tout that spells do something on a miss. Yeah, some do. Not ones with attack rolls though, they're just like a martial swinging a sword, except they take 2 actions instead of one, have less chance to hit, and do less than 2 attacks from said martial. You could cast shocking grasp for 2 actions to deal 2d12 on a hit. Or you could swing a greatsword, targeting the same defense, using only one action, for 1d12+something, and do that twice.

Spells either do something when the roll doesn't go in the caster's favor or their results if the roll does go in the caster's favor is very potent. All of them, even shocking grasp.

Here's a quick comparison of a greatsword-wielding champion's damage against an orc warrior vs. shocking grasp against the same creature: Greatsword has +7 to hit, then +2 to hit. Shocking grasp has +8 to hit because it gets a +1 vs. a target in metal armor. Let's give both the advantage of flanking, since these two characters very well could be flanking with each other.

This gives our greatsword champion a total average damage on their two Strikes of 11.55, and our shocking grasp caster a total average damage of 15.665 because more dice means bigger potential and the persistent damage that kicks in because the target has metal armor helps.

Balance is achieved since this cost a spell slot, and also provoked an opportunity attack which the chosen example target happens to actually have.

gnoams wrote:

True strike fixes things?

No, it makes things better - there is an important difference between the too. Namely that nothing is actually broken.

gnoams wrote:

You will usually choose the spell you cast in a situation based on what it does, not which defense it targets.

In many ways which defense a spell targets is what the spell does.

And still, you don't need to actually always have a spell that can target the perfect defense for it to be an advantage to casters - just it being possible that you can exploit a weakness is an advantage the non-casters kinda just don't get.

[PawnJJ]

gnoams wrote:

My first game caster experience was hitting a pair of zombies with burning hands, they both roll nat 1s! Woo, double crits, neither of them drop though. Then a martial character walks over to two fresh zombies, hits each of them and drops them in one swing each, with just normal hits. Yaaay, spellcasting is so awesome.

Well, zombies have weakness to slashing so they would probably have an advantage. Assuming they were shamblers with 20 HP and Weakness 5 Slashing, He/she would have had to roll an 11 on his d12 greatsword twice to kill both zombies assuming he has 18 strength and no other damage increase (which if he did would have required some additional setup like an action for a barb rage etc)

If you had swapped out those shamblers for spider swarms the perception would probably be completely flipped.

[graystone]

Palinurus wrote:

Deriven Firelion wrote:

...

Agree completely. I think boosting hit rolls is tricky because stacking a boost with true strike could be OP, but there's probably a neat solution that prevents this.

Make the boost a Fortune effect: "You can never have more than one fortune effect alter a single roll. If multiple fortune effects would apply, you have to pick which to use."

[Leomund "Leo" Velinznrarikovich]

Sorry to those who struggle with wizards. This wizard didn't let me down at level 3 (when I started playing him), through to level 7 (where he is now). He has been flavorful, flashy, and received some double-takes.

Yeah, his spell attack is lower than equivalent martial bonuses. And..? So I use save based spells. Or I use True Strike if I really want to hit. Sometimes I miss. *shrug* So do martials. If you don't want a spell that could miss there is always Magic Missile.

So far as I have played, the game feels balanced. It might not seem balanced when you pick out a small aspect to the game, but looking at it as a whole I am contented.

I, a wizard player, cannot relate to the complaints about spellcasters.

[Samurai]

thenobledrake wrote:

If a person can't reconcile knowing they are helping and having fun, they are playing the wrong character. It's not that their character isn't actually fun - it's that their fun hinges on something other than what the class is designed to provide.

No point eating meat if you don't like the way it tastes.

Why aren't the classes "designed to provide" basic usefulness and competence, equivalent to the other classes in the game?

That distinct (and, in most people's eyes, unfair) difference is what they are angry about. Fighters are the best attackers and start with Expert weapon prof. They have a purpose in the game and the game provides them with the ability to do that job. They may not hit every time, but they know that they usually have the best chance of hitting compared to the other characters. And they know they will have a chance to find/buy/create magical weapons and armor to further increase their chances of success, as well as use things like flanking to further help.

By contrast, the player that instead wanted to blast enemies with magic has several options (Wizard, Druid, Sorcerer, Witch), but none of them are very good at that job. They can only cast their best spells a few times per day, and once those slots are spent, they are left with only lackluster secondary options, like cantrips and lower level slots. Their chances of hitting are usually worse than the rest of the party. If a save is required instead, very often the enemy makes the save, so the PC only gets a minor "pity effect" for 1 round or so. And he knows that there are no magic items to be found in the game to bolster his abilities is any way. He also knows that he will be well behind (about 2 whole levels) the other characters in improving the rank of his main abilities, attacks, and defenses. Finally, it's hard for a caster to gain positioning bonuses because they are not front line characters.

So you combine all of those things (few effective slots per day, poor chance of a full effect, no magic items in game to aid/improve their spells, slower rank progression, hard to gain positioning bonus) and playing a "blaster caster" seems like it is not something that Pathfinder really allows anymore. Technically, there are ways you can still do it, (or an approximation of it), but it's clearly not supported or encouraged by the game anymore.

As far as the "no point eating meat if you don't like the taste" comment, here's a better analogy. Imagine if you and your group of friends have a habit of going out to eat every Friday night. Your favorite place to go is a place called P.F.'s, that was popular because it had great salads and vegetarian options for the vegans in your group, and great steaks and chicken for those that ate meat. So everyone could order what they like and enjoy the meal. Then one day, P.F.'s decides to go entirely vegan. They now only have meatless "beyond" patties and tofu "steaks" instead of the real thing anymore. The vegans in your group may be overjoyed by the change, but the rest of your group, who enjoyed a good steak or rack of ribs most Friday nights won't be happy at all!

[thenobledrake]

Samurai wrote:

Why aren't the classes "designed to provide" basic usefulness and competence, equivalent to the other classes in the game?

Loaded question - as classes do provide basic usefulness and competence equivalent to the other classes in the game. Your entire premise is flawed.

Being equal-meaning-identical is not the only way for things to be fair and equal-meaning-balanced.

Blaster casters actually do comparable damage to that of martial characters, even fighters, if they use their spells in favorable circumstances - despite that they don't get the exact same +this-to-attacks, because they also don't get the exact same +this-much-damage and this-much-range and this-many-targets.

It's all balanced quite well - more so than most other similar RPGs. The "issue" at hand is entirely one of arbitrarily treating whatever another class gets that your class doesn't as "high value" and whatever your class gets that the class you envy doesn't as "low value" and then complaining you don't have the things you assign high value to.

It's comparing two pencils, and declaring one clearly superior on account of it being painted black rather than yellow.

[The Raven Black]

I advise having a look at Deadmanwalking's houserules (in the homebrew board) for well-thought modifications to the system, especially for casters and alchemists.

Concerning attacking casters, there are a few, but not that many, needed to make the game more enjoyable for their players without unbalancing the system (which would end up in less fun for other players).

[kayman]

The spellcarters problem must be solved. I hope Secrets of Magic adress this issue, I think paizo staff need to listen to what the community are saying. I ran Age of Ashes AP and the disparate of power between the martial classes and magical classes was huge. We came to a point that in every session the wizard of the group was complaining about how he was not having fun....

Things that MUST BE SOLVED in my opinion (i dont know how).

1 - Incapacitation Trait

2 - Low level damage spells are useless at higher level

3 - Range of the Spells

4 - Number of spells slots.

5 - Something to boost spell DC and Spell Attack.

And this is very sad , because every other aspect of the game was praised by all member of the group.

Sorry for my bad english.
Gretings from Brasil

[thenobledrake]

kayman wrote:

I think paizo staff need to listen to what the community are saying

Are you saying that because you mean it, no matter what their view of the community is saying is... or is it conditional and you mean they need to listen to what the part of the community that agrees with you, no matter how small that part is, are saying?

kayman wrote:

2 - Low level damage spells becames useless in higher level

How is that an actual problem? Are casters that want to focus on damage not doing enough damage at all as is? Because if not, boosting low level damage spells in any meaningful way is just making casters more powerful than they need to be.

Also, even damage-focused casters can stand to use their lower-level spell slots that don't feel worthwhile to spend on more damaging spells to enhance their overall ability to inflict damage upon enemies - for example, true strike or fear to help with accuracy of the damage spells that do matter, blur or mirror image or similar spells to help you survive making all your foes mad at you with big damage spells, gravity well to get a shot at having more targets in place for an upcoming blasty spell, and other spells too because every level has some spells that don't need to be heightened to have great benefits.

kayman wrote:

3 - Range of the Spells

Yeah, they should probably take everything over 60 feet down considerably so that ultra-long range spells like fireball are only 120 feet range at most because it's just impractical for encounter areas to be big enough to make the huge range numbers currently in place actually relevant. (yes, I'm sarcastically pointing out that "range of spells must be solved" doesn't communicate what you even think the problem is.)

kayman wrote:

4 - Number of spells slots.

Another thing which, while I'm sure people that are complaining about casters currently would complain less as a result of, can't be done without going back to the paradigm of casters playing one game and everyone else playing a different game because casters would be hands-down better than non-casters almost across the board.

kayman wrote:

5 - Something to boost spell DC and Spell Attack.

That's filling a grid for the sake of filling a grid, not a thing that actually will objectively "increase fun" or "improve balance"

The game is actually better for not approaching things from a perspective of "well, weapons get potency runes so spells have to have them too" - there's more unique feel to character types if they are actually different in meaningful ways like they are, and it is possible to balance the game the way it has been balanced where there can be a lesser chance of a greater effect (spells) balanced against a greater chance of a lesser effect (weapon strikes)

Unfortunately, some folks got really used to having "I use magic" inherently mean "my character is just hands-down better than any character that doesn't" or "so I get to be able to easily solo encounters meant for the entire party to participate in equally" and since PF2 doesn't do that they complain "broken game! lame mechanics! Paizo has to fix this!" - even though it is clearly deliberate that PF2 doesn't do that.

[kayman]

thenobledrake wrote:

kayman wrote:

I think paizo staff need to listen to what the community are saying

Are you saying that because you mean it, no matter what their view of the community is saying is... or is it conditional and you mean they need to listen to what the part of the community that agrees with you, no matter how small that part is, are saying?

kayman wrote:

2 - Low level damage spells becames useless in higher level

How is that an actual problem? Are casters that want to focus on damage not doing enough damage at all as is? Because if not, boosting low level damage spells in any meaningful way is just making casters more powerful than they need to be.

Also, even damage-focused casters can stand to use their lower-level spell slots that don't feel worthwhile to spend on more damaging spells to enhance their overall ability to inflict damage upon enemies - for example, true strike or fear to help with accuracy of the damage spells that do matter, blur or mirror image or similar spells to help you survive making all your foes mad at you with big damage spells, gravity well to get a shot at having more targets in place for an upcoming blasty spell, and other spells too because every level has some spells that don't need to be heightened to have great benefits.

kayman wrote:

3 - Range of the Spells

Yeah, they should probably take everything over 60 feet down considerably so that ultra-long range spells like fireball are only 120 feet range at most because it's just impractical for encounter areas to be big enough to make the huge range numbers currently in place actually relevant. (yes, I'm sarcastically pointing out that "range of spells must be solved" doesn't communicate what you even think the problem is.)

kayman wrote:

4 - Number of spells slots.

Another thing which, while I'm sure people that are complaining about casters currently would complain less as a result of, can't be done without going back to the paradigm of casters playing one game and everyone else playing a...

I understand you points and as a GM i agree with most of then. What i am trying to say is that from the perspective of my experiance running Age of Ashes AP, the spellcasters was consideraly underpowerd when the campaign reached 12 level. I dont know how to solve this issues but thats is a perception that a lot of people are having with PF2. I think is wise for paizo to adress this problem. Once again i agree with your points that we must be carefull and not come back to the issues that previous editions had.

Sorry for my bad english

[Temperans]

The difference is that Martial Character were always the best at dealing damage.

What casters had was utility and with very intensive builds high damage.

Now all the utility is much weaker so that the magic is already mostly gone.

It also does not help that casters lost spells slots and have significant less interaction with the action system.

[dirtypool]

Temperans wrote:

The difference is that Martial Character were always the best at dealing damage.

I believe on this very forum we can dive into the PF1 threads and find out for ourselves that this is not universally true given the spells and feat combinations that were available in the 3.X ecosystem. Since 2nd edition it was possible for a wizard to have a build that made them a better damage dealer than a martial.

“Temperans” wrote:

What casters had was utility and with very intensive builds high damage.

Casters have utility now. The chief issue a lot of the “casting is ruined” folks have in getting their point across is their usage of language. Speaking of the prior editions “utility” when the prior edition allowed you to build a Wizard who was at once a caster AND a better Ranger than the Ranger or a better Barbarian than the Barbarian or a better fighter than the fighter is conflating utility and mastery.

No longer being able to wrest an entire encounter from the jaws of your fellow party members has not actually decreased your utility, it has just forced you to play the same game as the rest of us and on similar terms.

[Temperans]

Dirtypool in every DPR olympic the winners are martials cheesing the system by creation a combo.

Casters were strong, in combat because they had save or suck spells that could be made incredibly reliable or utility spells that if the GM did not play around them would negate the encounter.

Damage was not really the problem.

Also do note that I am fine with casters having lost power. I am just of the opinion they lost too much considering they have limited spell slots.

[dirtypool]

Temperans wrote:

Dirtypool in every DPR olympic the winners are martials cheesing the system by creation a combo.

Yes, and that is the only arena in which the martial gets to compete. Arguing that casters should have their own unique sphere of influence and maintain equality in the martials sphere of influence is not arguing for utility or parity. It is arguing for superiority. “The design space should be altered so that we are as good as martials are at what they do and we should also be better than we are currently at our unique abilities that they have no access to” isn’t about fairness

“Temperans” wrote:

Casters were strong, in combat because they had save or suck spells that could be made incredibly reliable or utility spells that if the GM did not play around them would negate the encounter.

Yes, casters were overpowered. Now they aren’t. Welcome to the new paradigm. Now you too can use feat combinations and spell combinations to upgrade your somewhat standard utility by a plus here or a plus there just like the martial has done for decades. Now we’re playing the same game more or less.

[Temperans]

Dirtypool a Caster who spent all their feats, items, and spells trying to deal more damage should deal more damage. Same for martials.

The opposite is also true spending all your feats, items, and spells trying to get utility should give you more utility. Same for martials.

Also you are moving the goal post. First you said that casters dealt too much damage and that is why they were broken. I disproved it and now you are saying I want superiority when I never asked for that.

There is a big difference between asking for limited use abilities not to fizzle while spending most of your turn using them. And asking for casters to have superiority.

Because that is the only want for abilities to not fizzle more often even thou you only get 3-4 uses in a day per spell level.

[thenobledrake]

dirtypool wrote:

Now the pendulum has barely tipped in the opposite direction and it is something that deserves thread after thread after thread of internet complaint.

I still remember when I was reading the then most recent release of the D&D rules and seeing how my favorite PC at the time would convert and how adventures would go from then on...

and I found out that while the effect of a spell like dominate person (renamed from domination) was still basically the same, the odds that my 15th-level fighter with a 15 Wisdom score negate the effect of an evil wizard casting the spell upon him had gone from 75% chance of success to about 35% (if not worse) unless I had actually had the luck to find an item to boost my saves and/or had invested a feat - but making up 8 points of difference just wasn't happening.

...and then just to rub even more salt in the wound, I noticed my chance to take half damage from a dragon's breath weapon had gone from 90% (thanks to my 16 Dexterity) to like 15% without those save boosters I didn't need before (and that definitely weren't going to make up that difference).

Yet somehow, basically everyone else (at the time - the hobby at large seems to have gotten tired of it over the decades since) was like "yeah, this seems totally fine. Great new rules, best game ever."

[thenobledrake]

Temperans wrote:

There is a big difference between asking for limited use abilities not to fizzle while spending most of your turn using them. And asking for casters to have superiority.

Because that is the only want for abilities to not fizzle more often even thou you only get 3-4 uses in a day per spell level.

When everyone else has their stuff "fizzle" too, and typically on 2 of the 4 possible outcomes for a roll rather than the 1 of 4 a caster typically gets, asking for limited use abilities to not fizzle while not also asking for the overall effects to be toned down so that not fizzling would still be the same power-level rather than an across the board power boost that only applies to casters sure sounds like asking for casters to have superiority.

The situation as-is has been demonstrated to be fairly balanced (at least more fairly balanced than most other versions of the game), but "feels un-fun" for some people. That means nothing that increases effectiveness, not even if it's in the name of "would feel more fun" for the people not already having a blast, can be done without resulting in caster superiority. That's why every time someone says "fix casters" and they mean "give them something cooler than what they current have" people respond as if the person is asking for caster superiority - because they are, even if they didn't mean to be.