|
Firing 7 arrows in 6 seconds? Again Xanxia, but normal in-game.Nah, that's legit.
Seeing the trailer for a trade show dedicated to hunters as the advertising before the Youtube film you linked was something special :-)
Seeing people firing rifles, and not very rapidly, had me saying "What!?" before realizing it was advertising. LOL
You could just take out the Feat Taxes like Combat Expertise, Quick Draw, Power Attack, Combat Reflexes, Dodge/Mobility, etc.,Since when are Quick Draw and Combat Reflexes feat taxes now? I've never seen them referred to as such (and EITR doesn't mention them).
Given that high dex already gets you free boosts to initiative and reflex and armor class (and high str does not), it's really not good design to give dex-based characters everything else for free as well.
Although others might disagree with me on this, I consider Quick Draw to be a Feat Tax, and it's because drawing things you can fight with as a free action is too good to not get. The value of Quick Draw also has a lot to do with "how" I use my DM fiat with PC's and NPC's rolling 1's when attacking, because I'll break your weapons and snap bow/crossbow strings, and if you're lucky, you just pitch the weapon a couple squares away, lodge the weapon into a tree or a wall (Str Check DC 20 to dislodge the weapon), or accidentally hit your ally (and cause damage). I'm also not bashful with ambushes when your weapons are sheathed, like when you're in a marketplace or enjoying a meal and drinks in a tavern. So being able to pull out a backup weapon as a free action (or even your primary weapon) is so important that I just give it to everyone, NPC's included.
Anywho, I house rule that "if you're proficient with a weapon, you can Quick Draw it as a free action". I give casters an option when they create their character: they get quick draw with weapons that they have proficiency, --or-- they can quick draw scrolls, wands, MM rods that are readily accessible (such as affixed to a bandolier or belt).
I would consider Quick Draw to fall into this category:
abilities that (according to somebody on the internet) "everybody" should be able to do without "training".
And it's because during your training with the weapons you're proficient in, I pretend that your instructor understood how fast you can die in combat if you take ~2.9-3.0 seconds to draw your weapon as a Move Action, so somewhere in your training you practiced drawing your weapon quickly.
I also consider Combat Reflexes as a feat tax because it's a prerequisite for many feats, and some Str-based martials or non-AoO-focused martials would rather not get it but are forced to nevertheless. For example, Bodyguard, In Harm's Way, Stand Still, Pin Down.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Drawing a weapon does take a "lot" of time though. Doing that more quickly would take training. Adventurers adventuring through a dungeon should already have their weapons in hand anyway.
And what's the point of doing a lot of ambushes if you are just going to freely negate the penalties for ambushes?
Drawing a weapon does take a "lot" of time though. Doing that more quickly would take training. Adventurers adventuring through a dungeon should already have their weapons in hand anyway.
And what's the point of doing a lot of ambushes if you are just going to freely negate the penalties for ambushes?
Even with having Quick Draw, Ambushes present their own challenges, such as all the enemies getting to act in the Surprise Round and only those PC's who pass a Perc check do. And in an "Eat or be Eaten" world, ambushes are the best way to win, so it's only natural that they should occur as often as possible whenever dealing with rogue-ish, non-paladin types.
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
On the topic of "Martials can't have nice things", GM Fiat Fumble Rules is pretty up there.
"You're a highly trained soldier whose been doing it for several years? Sorry, once every 20 swings your sword explodes."
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
On the topic of "Martials can't have nice things", GM Fiat Fumble Rules is pretty up there.
"You're a highly trained soldier whose been doing it for several years? Sorry, once every 20 swings your sword explodes."
Yep, this is actually an example of martials can't have nice things. They have to have a big penalty attached to a 5% chance of failure for something they're probably doing 3/4 times a turn. Which means in 4 attacks, you have about a 20% chance of rolling a 1 (calculated as 1-(0.95^n) where n is the number of attacks, and 0.95 is your chance to not roll a 1 on a d20). Over 20 attacks you have about a 65% chance of rolling a 1. So fumbles rules basically mean every combat, whatever thing your GM likes to inflict on you is going to happen.
Missing the attack is bad enough, no need to make things worse.
|
EitR is very popular in play-by-post, but less so in Paper. In Play-By-Post, the focus is less on combat and more on narrative and planning. The fun of rolling a big number is diminished in a browser. So the natural inclination is to play more casters and fewer martials. EitR lets martials have more fun, and diversify. There is a big problem with it for half martials, however. Bards and Magus under EitR have many of the same powers as a full martial, and can buff themselves up to the same numbers as a martial. Even worse, they can take some of the stronger caster feats.
The real solution to this issue is to play PF2 instead. Martial/Caster disparity is much reduced, if not gone in that edition.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
To be fair, I also use similar GM fiat if you roll 20's on any of your attacks too-- not only do you deal x2/x3/x4 damage, but something awesome happens on top of that. For example, if you roll a 15-19 and confirm it as a critical, it deals double, triple, or quadruple damage as per normal crit rules, but nothing special other than that happens. However, if you roll a nat 20 on an attack, not only does it auto-confirm (house rule), but I'll throw in awesome stuff like knocking the target prone, staggering the target, sundering the target's armor, or hitting the guy so hard he drops his weapon or shield, etc. And if you kill someone with a nat 20 roll, I'll most certainly ask you to describe the attack Matt Mercer-esquely "how would you like that to look?", and if you describe it awesomely/gruesomely, you might get a free intimidate to demoralize all other enemies within 30ft as "blood and gore sprays like a fountain over the rest of your enemies". Or, maybe they cower in fear, or give up and run. One of the enemies might even see the carnage and betray the rest of his buddies saying "spare me and I'll help you kill them!" Or possibly even betray the BBEG saying, "please don't kill me! I'll tell you how you can defeat Balthazzar the Lootwagon if you spare me!"
I personally think nat 20's should be amazing, and nat 1's should be likewise amazing but just not in your favor. I love the feeling the PC's get when they roll a 20, because it's a "F$#% YES!" moment and they KNOW something crazy good is about to happen. I also enjoy the feeling the PC's get when they roll a 1, because it's an "oh s*^@" moment, and something horrible is about to happen.
It might sound weird to say this, but I think rolling dice is a lot more fun when you know you can fail horribly or massively succeed, not just a "you roll a 1, you miss, you roll a 20, confirm it, ok you deal x2 dmg, next attack"- sort of thing.
And this isn't just an attack thing, I do the same for saves and ability checks too. I also do it for rolling 20's on skills even though RAW you cannot critically succeed on skills, I still allow critical successes on skills, but I don't count nat 1's on skills as critical failure.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Not to side track too much, but fumble punishing goes away when you have to both confirm the fumble and you use your full BAB on the confirm (just because you're attacking with the 5th level equivalent bab attack doesn't mean you suddenly forget how to fight like a 20th level character). You will start fumbling when you're fighting out of your depth, and maybe the tarrasque really did wrench your sword free, or you shattered it on it's carapace, but it's not going to happen anywhere nearly as regularly even when you're fighting an army of 400 level one fighters back to back.
So basic answer is if your players are power grubbing munchkins, they don't need a power boost anyway. If they are looking for a story where they can be martial and not feel useless to the overall story besides being Dave McDoorkicker, give them the tools to let them branch out. It's not an end all be all, but the latter group isn't playing to the extreme levels of game sense that is needed to actually make casters impossible to match anyway.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
To me the EITR seems to be a solution in search of a problem. This post is on its second page and there is still no real consensus on what it is designed to fix.
It obviously does not fix the martial to caster disparity. In a lot of ways, it makes it even worse. The most popular Magnus build is the high critical shocking grasp specialist. Normally the magus would need to at least pick up weapon finesse but using these rules it is free. Most casters are not going to take combat expertise but now get that for free. For something like a bad touch cleric this is pretty much free AC. Their medium BAB means they usually don’t have a problem hitting their opponents touch AC even with the penalty to hit from combat expertise.
The other big argument is that it helps Martials get cool things. This is false because in it itself it does not give anything; it simply allows you to get the cool things earlier. The idea of getting your cool stuff earlier seems to be the big draw. The problem is that ALL builds take a while to come online. Inquisitors don’t get bane until 5th level, and even then, you can only use it for a single round. Low level cleric spells are pretty underwhelming and at low levels you get very few of them. Other than full arcane casters most classes are pretty much the same until you get to at least 5th or 6th level. Before that your stats have a larger impact on your effectiveness than your class. At 1st level an elf wizard with an 18 STR will actually do better than a fighter with a 10 STR when using a long sword.
The last argument that seems popular is that these feats represent something that everybody already knows how to do. People glance at a feat and think that is something I know how to do. In reality that is not true. Take power attack for example. If you ask most gamers to give an example of using power attack with a two-handed weapon, they will immediately think of raising the sword above your head for extra damage. That type of blow in reality leaves you exposed and usually ends up getting you killed. It also takes long to execute and is incredibly difficult to recover from. Doing this should reduce your AC and prevent you from taking any other attacks. A real example of power attack is using the hand at the top of hilt to position the blade and using the hand at the bottom of the hilt to pivot the blade to give you more power and control, and to allow you to quickly recover from the blow. The reason the sword does more damage is that the end of the sword is actually moving faster than the movement of the hilt and therefore delivers more kinetic energy. This is the same reason you can pedal a bike and the wheels of the bike turn go faster than the pedal.
I fail to see how this adds anything to the game.
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32
|
Although others might disagree with me on this, I consider Quick Draw to be a Feat Tax, and it's because drawing things you can fight with as a free action is too good to not get. The value of Quick Draw also has a lot to do with "how" I use my DM fiat
Sure, but your post suggests you houserule in a particular way that makes Quick Draw better. Nothing wrong with that, but that doesn't make QD a feat tax in most games (indeed, I've only very rarely see anyone take it).
To me the EITR seems to be a solution in search of a problem. This post is on its second page and there is still no real consensus on what it is designed to fix.
That's a very good summary.
|
|
The last argument that seems popular is that these feats represent something that everybody already knows how to do
The funniest part of that argument is that it applies to spellcasters too.
"Everyone can use a higher spell slot to cast a spell, there is no reason to need a feat (Heighten spell) to reap the benefit of doing that."
"Everyone can use a higher spell slot to cast a spell and tables 2.5 and 2.6 at p. 130 of Ultimate Magic clearly show what is the intended damage for each level of a spell, why do we need Intensified spell to get the benefits?"
It obviously does not fix the martial to caster disparity. In a lot of ways, it makes it even worse. The most popular Magnus build is the high critical shocking grasp specialist. Normally the magus would need to at least pick up weapon finesse but using these rules it is free. Most casters are not going to take combat expertise but now get that for free. For something like a bad touch cleric this is pretty much free AC. Their medium BAB means they usually don’t have a problem hitting their opponents touch AC even with the penalty to hit from combat expertise.
Non-archetyped (read Kensai) magus' are better as a strength build than a dex build. The fact that Kensai is just that good of a dex/light armor build that virtually everyone takes it is a problem with Paizo's design, not the design where less start up cost for a build is more. Very few bad touch clerics will only ever be casting touch spells as opposed to any other melee attacks, and even when they are casting touch spells, the +1-4 AC they get from Combat Expertise won't bring them anywhere near the AC of their actual dedicated front line combatants.
The other big argument is that it helps Martials get cool things. This is false because in it itself it does not give anything; it simply allows you to get the cool things earlier. The idea of getting your cool stuff earlier seems to be the big draw. The problem is that ALL builds take a while to come online.
Getting things earlier means you have more time (read feats remaining) to get more than the core of your build. Instead of just building for archery, now you can also build TWF, or maybe a 2h cleave build. This is completely comparable to a cleric who can cast flame strike as a minor AoE damage effect vs being able to also cast destruction as a single target massive damage effect. As several people have said before, those extra new things don't also have to be combat oriented, plenty of flavorful feats for those kinds of players to take, and if your concern is your players will simply use the "extra" feats for purely combat boosts, then maybe take the time to learn and understand your players, understand the threat level of you are presenting compared to their character's strength, and then decide if they simply are needing the boost to keep ahead or just power grubby rollplayers that like winning with no real challenge or threat of defeat. For example, I have an elephant in the room swashbuckler with 7 feats at level 7, but she is a kitsune and spent 3 of her 7 feats on the extra tail line (plus improved init, which is sorta unnecessary), because even after that "wasted" expenditure she still outclasses an EitR, power built fighter (because again Paizo design is bonkers).
Inquisitors don’t get bane until 5th level, and even then, you can only use it for a single round. Low level cleric spells are pretty underwhelming and at low levels you get very few of them. Other than full arcane casters most classes are pretty much the same until you get to at least 5th or 6th level. Before that your stats have a larger impact on your effectiveness than your class. At 1st level an elf wizard with an 18 STR will actually do better than a fighter with a 10 STR when using a long sword.
Inquisitors get bane for level rounds per day, which even at only level 5, is enough to ensure they can power through the main fight of the day. Cleric spells are the ones with the most staying across all spell levels: Shield of Faith, Divine Favor, Barkskin, Greater Stunning Barrier, Channel Vigor, Blessing of Fervor, Divine Power, Mighty Strength, Righteous Might, etc. The problem is getting them all active for long enough so that you aren't just self buffing while the fighter kills the enemy for you; but by level 9 and you are casting 5th level spells, you can throw up 3 r/lvl spells, kick open the door, and still have half a minute to rip and tear through the room. Wizard might have slightly more trouble keeping his lower slots useful, but there are plenty of utility spells they aren't meant to be using in combat that can perfectly fill, as if they were the utility caster by design. And sure, the strength wizard will be a better fighter than the fighter, but the fighter is also completely incapable of doing the wizard's job, so of course by not sticking in lanes, the group is double hamstrung, it just so happens that martials can't pivot when the casters actually can, and even get a spell (Transformation) to help them in doing so.
The last argument that seems popular is that these feats represent something that everybody already knows how to do. People glance at a feat and think that is something I know how to do. In reality that is not true. Take power attack for example. If you ask most gamers to give an example of using power attack with a two-handed weapon, they will immediately think of raising the sword above your head for extra damage. That type of blow in reality leaves you exposed and usually ends up getting you killed. It also takes long to execute and is incredibly difficult to recover from. Doing this should reduce your AC and prevent you from taking any other attacks. A real example of power attack is using the hand at the top of hilt to position the blade and using the hand at the bottom of the hilt to pivot the blade to give you more power and control, and to allow you to quickly recover from the blow. The reason the sword does more damage is that the end of the sword is actually moving faster than the movement of the hilt and therefore delivers more kinetic energy. This is the same reason you can pedal a bike and the wheels of the bike turn go faster than the pedal.
Aside from your example being physically (as in the science) false, that gripping is still something anyone can and real historical fighters actually do do. Hitting someone closer with the blade imparts the same kinetic energy because the forces of both parts of the wielder's fulcrum are the same; in essence you've changed speed of the impact (not that important for bladed weapons) for applied force as it takes much more effort to push back against the close blade than the long blade; but damage isn't modeled in speed of hit or even with the assumption that every "hit" cuts, so if you get slammed by essentially a powerful shove, it's the same thing as if you got slapped really fast by the same guy near the tip of his blade into your helmet. The analogy goes even more out the window when we get to clubs, hammers, flails, etc. which actually do require windups for effective power differences, when shields begin to afford you those windups, and so on. The real difference of power attack is accuracy for damage, which can be as simply as aiming for the head; the feat for ranged attacks is more aptly named, "Deadly-Aim".
|
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32
|
Non-archetyped (read Kensai) magus' are better as a strength build than a dex build.
Yes, and the reason for this is because the dex build requires two feats. If you get those feats for free, well, nobody will play the strength build any more.
the +1-4 AC they get from Combat Expertise won't bring them anywhere near the AC of their actual dedicated front line combatants.
Given how powerful clerics already are, do you really think they should get a sizeable AC bonus for free?
The real difference of power attack is accuracy for damage, which can be as simply as aiming for the head
In mechanical terms, Power Attack increases your damage. It is quite reasonable design to pay a cost (i.e. a feat) to gain a benefit (i.e. more damage), exactly like how Weapon Spec, or Acc Sneak Attacker, or Arcane Strike all cost a feat. It is simply false that all melee characters take Power Attack, so it doesn't make sense to label it "a feat tax".
If your players feel the need to ramp up damage asap, EITR helps them get there faster. If your players don't feel that is necessary, then EITR helps them finish the core part of their build for their concept so they can select features not immediately applicable to killing things faster and become more versatile.
From a design perspective, Combat Expertise and Power Attack in particular should just be base assumptions of the game. They're tradeoff feats that simply help classes with extraneous attack bonus focus elsewhere. Mathematically, Power Attack is required to keep up with lategame damage. (Insert counter example of a character buffed to their gills here or extremely specific corner case.)
Weapon Finesse is another artifact of shabby design too. Most TTRPGs now either have just dex to attack or dex to damage.
Making people jump through hoops and wait till 7th level to get their idea off the ground is dumb.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
"I want it and I want it now!"
Any goal for the other 19 levels?
If you get everything within the first few levels, you end feeling that your character gets little growth, it is simply a more refined version of what he was at level 1.
Probably you will feel even more envy for those pesky spellcasters that gets new spells every two levels.
|
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32
|
Mathematically, Power Attack is required to keep up with lategame damage.
Unless you've got Smite Evil, or Sneak Attack, or Greater TWF, or... well there's plenty of alternatives here. Clearly those are all ridiculous corner cases :D
Weapon Finesse is another artifact of shabby design too. Most TTRPGs now either have just dex to attack or dex to damage.
But in PF, if you give the dex build everything for free, there's no reason to play a str build any more.
Making people jump through hoops and wait till 7th level to get their idea off the ground is dumb.
And this thread so far has zero actual examples of ideas that don't get off the ground until level 7. Huh, I wonder why that is?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
"I want it and I want it now!"
Any goal for the other 19 levels?If you get everything within the first few levels, you end feeling that your character gets little growth, it is simply a more refined version of what he was at level 1.
Probably you will feel even more envy for those pesky spellcasters that gets new spells every two levels.
My goal is just to have fun playing the character, not getting an extra +1 or a feat. A gradual evolution of the character I was at level 1 is exactly what I look for.
Mathematically, Power Attack is required to keep up with lategame damage.Unless you've got Smite Evil, or Sneak Attack, or Greater TWF, or... well there's plenty of alternatives here. Clearly those are all ridiculous corner cases :D
Weapon Finesse is another artifact of shabby design too. Most TTRPGs now either have just dex to attack or dex to damage.But in PF, if you give the dex build everything for free, there's no reason to play a str build any more.
Making people jump through hoops and wait till 7th level to get their idea off the ground is dumb.And this thread so far has zero actual examples of ideas that don't get off the ground until level 7. Huh, I wonder why that is?
Sneak Attack is jank and is a great example of builds that dont function well. Smite Evil is a daily resource. TWF is one of the worst fighting styles in the game and frequently fails at doing it's basic shtick.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Using a pivot, you can move the hilt of the sword a short amount and the top of the blade moves much farther and at a faster rate. This is the same effect when the outside of a wheel moves at a higher speed than the inner part. That is real world physics. Combine that with also moving the blade at the same time and you can impart significantly more kinetic energy this way then swinging it the way most people do.
So, place your right hand near the top of the hilt of the sword and your left hand at the bottom. Hold the sword so that the hilt is near your stomach and the right hand close to your body and the left hand farther away from your body with the top of the blade over your shoulder. Use your right hand to move the sword in the direction of the strike you want to make, while at the same time using your left hand to pull the bottom of the hilt behind the top of the hilt. The top of the blade is traveling at a much higher speed than the lower part and because of this deal more damage. I have moved the hilt of the sword maybe a foot, but the top of it has traveled much farther than that. To recover from the blow simply reverse your movements and you are back into position. If you need to block or change the angle of your blow you can do so quickly and efficiently.
Compare that to swinging a sword like a baseball bat. Now to move the blade requires moving your hand much further and recovering from a miss takes a lot longer. You are also exerting yourself more and will tire out sooner. The blade is moving slower than if you used a proper grip and because of that does less damage.
I used to hang out with the SCA and the running joke was what do you call someone who puts their hands above their shoulder in a fight? The answer was dead.
|
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Sneak Attack is jank and is a great example of builds that dont function well. Smite Evil is a daily resource. TWF is one of the worst fighting styles in the game and frequently fails at doing it's basic shtick.
Well, if you can't even make a build with sneak attack or smite or TWF function reasonably well, then you'll need all the help you can get. I suppose that's a decent use case for EITR, then :P
Sneak Attack is jank and is a great example of builds that dont function well. Smite Evil is a daily resource. TWF is one of the worst fighting styles in the game and frequently fails at doing it's basic shtick.Well, if you can't even make a build with sneak attack or smite or TWF function reasonably well, then you'll need all the help you can get. I suppose that's a decent use case for EITR, then :P
You can. It's just not worth the effort to anymore when there are simply better and less complex alternatives. Something as basic as "Fighting with a melee weapon and a ranged weapon in the same round" doesn't really work till like 7th level for example.
Sure you can do a bunch of multiclassing and dips to cobble something together that sorta vaguely looks like what you want...but why do that when I can use some well made 3rd party rules or houserules?
|
|
My goal is just to have fun playing the character, not getting an extra +1 or a feat. A gradual evolution of the character I was at level 1 is exactly what I look for.
You can. It's just not worth the effort to anymore when there are simply better and less complex alternatives. Something as basic as "Fighting with a melee weapon and a ranged weapon in the same round" doesn't really work till like 7th level for example.Sure you can do a bunch of multiclassing and dips to cobble something together that sorta vaguely looks like what you want...but why do that when I can use some well made 3rd party rules or houserules?
Based on that two posts, I think you are a rarity among the people that like EITR. Most of the posts I have seen made by people that like it speak of reducing the "gap" between casters and martials, but end in choices that increase it, wanting stuff that increases the damage dealt or the efficiency of their preferred weapon or technique, not diversifying and thinking to become good at using a noticeably different combat style.
BTW, my opinion is that most players end up using EITR to get "an extra +1 or a feat". For me starting play with a character that barely knows how to dodge and getting the spring attack chain of feats (as an example) is part of the gradual evolution of a character.
From my point of view, it would be more satisfying to be able to develop two different chains at the same time, with one lagging a bit behind the other than to get almost all the pieces of some chain at level 1 at no cost.
Using a pivot, you can move the hilt of the sword a short amount and the top of the blade moves much farther and at a faster rate. This is the same effect when the outside of a wheel moves at a higher speed than the inner part. That is real world physics. Combine that with also moving the blade at the same time and you can impart significantly more kinetic energy this way then swinging it the way most people do.
So, place your right hand near the top of the hilt of the sword and your left hand at the bottom. Hold the sword so that the hilt is near your stomach and the right hand close to your body and the left hand farther away from your body with the top of the blade over your shoulder. Use your right hand to move the sword in the direction of the strike you want to make, while at the same time using your left hand to pull the bottom of the hilt behind the top of the hilt. The top of the blade is traveling at a much higher speed than the lower part and because of this deal more damage. I have moved the hilt of the sword maybe a foot, but the top of it has traveled much farther than that. To recover from the blow simply reverse your movements and you are back into position. If you need to block or change the angle of your blow you can do so quickly and efficiently.
Compare that to swinging a sword like a baseball bat. Now to move the blade requires moving your hand much further and recovering from a miss takes a lot longer. You are also exerting yourself more and will tire out sooner. The blade is moving slower than if you used a proper grip and because of that does less damage.
I used to hang out with the SCA and the running joke was what do you call someone who puts their hands above their shoulder in a fight? The answer was dead.
Yes I am aware how physics works. But you must exert more force on the shorter grip to make the same force exert on the further tip, that's called lever arm. Someone wearing plate or a glove can much more easily wrest that swing when your hands are placed really close to one another as opposed to up in a half sword (not that this is the main point of a half-sword technique). In your second description, you're forgetting that in order for your grip to not fall apart, you are actually exerting the most force with your hand in the middle of the blade as it pushes down/forward, while the hand on the hilt, at one end of the lever is only a percentage of the total lever which is at best matched on the opposite end (if you actually grip it at the mid point). If your grip is at all off perfect center, the amount of force that the middle hand exerts relative to the hilt hand becomes exponentially greater as the distance between anchor points becomes smaller. (This is also why you would put your dominant hand up on the sword if you were actually swinging this way, say with a zwei-hander, but maybe left is your dominant.)
Mathematically, Power Attack is required to keep up with lategame damage.Unless you've got Smite Evil, or Sneak Attack, or Greater TWF, or... well there's plenty of alternatives here. Clearly those are all ridiculous corner cases :D
Weapon Finesse is another artifact of shabby design too. Most TTRPGs now either have just dex to attack or dex to damage.But in PF, if you give the dex build everything for free, there's no reason to play a str build any more.
Making people jump through hoops and wait till 7th level to get their idea off the ground is dumb.And this thread so far has zero actual examples of ideas that don't get off the ground until level 7. Huh, I wonder why that is?
So unless you are (remember at the time 2012 when the idea was originally made) a Paladin or Rogue, a 2 handed build which is getting dunked on for AC (no AAT, probably a chained barbarian, unhindering shield, etc.), or even more hilariously a Ranger not getting screwed by their laughable extra damage mechanic, your only chance to overcome major late game DR is power attack, let alone keep up with expect damage output. A sword and board fighter is doing ~d8+10str+5enhance+4wt+4ws=~27.5 before power attack at level 20. Against a DR 20 enemy, he's doing 7.5 per hit; power attacking (which likely reduces his number of hits per round) he does 19.5 dmg per hit. Sure this fighter had 20+ feats to pick up power attack, but that's not the point, the point is now instead of just being good at full attacking in twf with a shield that does even less damage and hits less often (because weapon groups aren't a thing except for weapon training), he can do a couple other cool things as well.
Weapon finesse is something literally given for free to 2 classes now. Maybe this argument stood on any ground back in 2012, but between Unrogue and Swashbuckler as well as all the other classes that can take WF as a selected class ability, there really isn't. That same argument of "why build strength" literally applies to "why build fighter" when swashbuckler can out AC the AC tank fighters, while out attack bonusing the attack bonus fighters, while also out defending the save focused fighters, while also out damaging the 2h fighters, all for the cost of 4 feats over fighter, which is replaced by the everything that swashbuckler gets. Str builds were always in trouble.
How fast can you make a whirlwind build come online? Why does it require spring attack? Is it really worth it when it takes all those feats to once in a blue moon be able to make a single attack against the 2-4 people that are all within your reach? Why do all that when cleave will usually work just as well (especially if the enemies are weaker than you meaning you majorly outclass their AC with your attack and aren't bottlenecked by having to hit to continue the cleave)?
"I want it and I want it now!"
Any goal for the other 19 levels?If you get everything within the first few levels, you end feeling that your character gets little growth, it is simply a more refined version of what he was at level 1.
Probably you will feel even more envy for those pesky spellcasters that gets new spells every two levels.
How about start looking for other feat trees to go down, if not picking up fluff things like my character's aforementioned tail feats?
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
How about start looking for other feat trees to go down, if not picking up fluff things like my character's aforementioned tail feats?
Probably I am prejudiced, but my impression is that most players, or at least most players that care about the damage Olympics, will not spend feats in different feat trees or fluff feats.
They will go for more dakka with the only and true weapon.in this thread, we have two certified exceptions: you and Scavion.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Probably I am prejudiced, but my impression is that most players, or at least most players that care about the damage Olympics, will not spend feats in different feat trees or fluff feats.
They will go for more dakka with the only and true weapon.
My experience is the same as yours. Giving players more options and freedom generally just leads to bigger numbers with their preferred attacks. Even when they aren't needed. Sure, you can do 100+ damage with your attack routine, but the enemy doesn't have that much HP, nor does most things you are fighting at this level. But... well, its a shame that you failed that Will save right there... Hope your allies survive that attack routine so they can properly chew you out later.
My experience is the same as yours. Giving players more options and freedom generally just leads to bigger numbers with their preferred attacks. Even when they aren't needed. Sure, you can do 100+ damage with your attack routine, but the enemy doesn't have that much HP, nor does most things you are fighting at this level. But... well, its a shame that you failed that Will save right there... Hope your allies survive that attack routine so they can properly chew you out later.Probably I am prejudiced, but my impression is that most players, or at least most players that care about the damage Olympics, will not spend feats in different feat trees or fluff feats.
They will go for more dakka with the only and true weapon.
Sounds like a problem that resolves itself. :P
|
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32
|
Something as basic as "Fighting with a melee weapon and a ranged weapon in the same round" doesn't really work till like 7th level for example.
It seems to me that you can either take the TWF feat or a class with flurry of blows; and then you can fight with a melee weapon and ranged weapon in the same round. You can even do melee, 5' step, then a ranged attack; or vice versa.
And that's at level one, with minimal investment. I'm wondering what else you feel is required to make this "really work".
|
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32
|
Getting back to the topic of feat taxes, I define "feat tax" as a feat that does something you don't want or need, but that you have to take as a prereq for something else.
The big offenders here are Combat Expertise, Dodge, IUS, Shield Focus, and Weapon Focus. The Dirty Fighting feat goes a long way in alleviating this, but generally I'd like to houserule that any character can ignore these five feats for the purpose of prereqs. Or perhaps it should be any non-caster class that can ignore them.
This doesn't mean that I object to feat chains in general (and indeed, EITR also does little or nothing about feat chains in general, despite claiming to). I like the concept of style feats, although not all style feats are good.
Something as basic as "Fighting with a melee weapon and a ranged weapon in the same round" doesn't really work till like 7th level for example.It seems to me that you can either take the TWF feat or a class with flurry of blows; and then you can fight with a melee weapon and ranged weapon in the same round. You can even do melee, 5' step, then a ranged attack; or vice versa.
And that's at level one, with minimal investment. I'm wondering what else you feel is required to make this "really work".
It's a pretty gross oversimplification. Flurry is locked to specific weapons. The specific flavor often requested is fighting in melee with both weapons(Like a hand crossbow or pistol). You can't reload until combat is over essentially. It's not exactly the most outrageous concept either.
Just to be clear, I'm not here to really argue with you. I'm not really sure if I accidentally kicked your puppy or something for you to be so passive aggressive. These things are kinda just facts of the system. These and other optional supplements wouldn't exist if large portions of the playerbase(and the devs themselves) didn't find similar issues.
On Topic:
These houserules are also a nice way to liven up some encounters as the GM since it frees up some feats to fit in other interesting options like Combat Maneuvers. I'm one of my group's main DMs so the idea that only power hungry players looking to minmax damage find this appealing is frankly weird.
I don’t understand what the big deal is with having to wait until 7th level for something to come online. A 1st level character is not supposed to be a seasoned and experienced character they are supposed to be beginners that are still wet behind the ears. They are the equivalent of the nerd from the suburbs who has never touched a gun before and just got out of boot camp, not a member of seal team 6. Expecting them to be able to fight effectively with both a ranged and a melee attack in the same round is kind of silly. They cannot even fight effectively with a single attack. Try throwing a 1st level party against a young black dragon (CR 7 creature) and see how well they survive.
If you want to have your starting character to be more experienced start them at a higher level.
|
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32
|
I don’t understand what the big deal is with having to wait until 7th level for something to come online. A 1st level character is not supposed to be a seasoned and experienced character they are supposed to be beginners that are still wet behind the ears.
Yeah, that.
Like, what if a player wants Phantasmal Killer for his character concept, is he entitled to that at level 1, or do you make him "jump through hoops" and wait all the way until level 7 to get it online? And why is that a problem?
I don’t understand what the big deal is with having to wait until 7th level for something to come online. A 1st level character is not supposed to be a seasoned and experienced character they are supposed to be beginners that are still wet behind the ears. They are the equivalent of the nerd from the suburbs who has never touched a gun before and just got out of boot camp, not a member of seal team 6. Expecting them to be able to fight effectively with both a ranged and a melee attack in the same round is kind of silly. They cannot even fight effectively with a single attack. Try throwing a 1st level party against a young black dragon (CR 7 creature) and see how well they survive.
If you want to have your starting character to be more experienced start them at a higher level.
Can that nerd from the suburbs also not swing a baseball bat overly hard when he tries to defend his pocket protector from the schoolyard bully? Honestly, the inexperienced person is more likely to go the overswing method and miss with a wild attack instead of take a measured swing first to ensure you "hit" or properly zone the bully for a power attack. Or maybe the nerd is scared and wants to not swing as forwardly to protect himself. Even elephant in the room says you still need bab 1 for those "free feats" first, so if our nerd is actually the equivalent of a fighter or other full bab martial class, then at level 1, he should be at least competent enough to do those things.
I don’t understand what the big deal is with having to wait until 7th level for something to come online. A 1st level character is not supposed to be a seasoned and experienced character they are supposed to be beginners that are still wet behind the ears.Yeah, that.
Like, what if a player wants Phantasmal Killer for his character concept, is he entitled to that at level 1, or do you make him "jump through hoops" and wait all the way until level 7 to get it online? And why is that a problem?
Is the character able to cast phantasmal killer not going to get another main spell at later levels to also be good at? The guy who spent 7 levels just to be able to spring attack or cleave or shoot a bow with multishot+rapid shot still isn't even at the peak of that ability. Sure the caster might be able to pick up some things that let them raise the DC on PK, but by the time a character finishes the cleave line, or finishes a single combat maneuver line, etc. to fully enable the tree, they have maybe one or two feats remaining in a campaign and are level 13-17; meanwhile the PK caster has gotten 3-5 more levels of spells to choose from on top of their main stick.
|
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32
|
by the time a character finishes the cleave line, or finishes a single combat maneuver line, etc. to fully enable the tree, they have maybe one or two feats remaining in a campaign and are level 13-17
The discussion at hand is not whether martials are on par with casters, but whether it's totally unfair if a character has to wait all the way until level 7 ("jumping through hoops") in order to get the trick he built his character for.
I don’t understand what the big deal is with having to wait until 7th level for something to come online. A 1st level character is not supposed to be a seasoned and experienced character they are supposed to be beginners that are still wet behind the ears. They are the equivalent of the nerd from the suburbs who has never touched a gun before and just got out of boot camp, not a member of seal team 6. Expecting them to be able to fight effectively with both a ranged and a melee attack in the same round is kind of silly. They cannot even fight effectively with a single attack. Try throwing a 1st level party against a young black dragon (CR 7 creature) and see how well they survive.
If you want to have your starting character to be more experienced start them at a higher level.
I'm getting old man. 6 levels represents literally months of game play. And for what? To basically throw water balloons at my enemies because they made a pretty basic fighting style poorly?
A level 1 character isn't "fresh out of boot camp." A Fighter takes about 3 years to train up for a Human.
Try throwing a 1st level party against a young black dragon (CR 7 creature) and see how well they survive.
I'm genuinely baffled that you think fighting with a cutlass and pistol is equivalent to a black dragon or seal team 6. This is a huge part of why houserules like this got popular. Some portions of the hobby apparently think martials should be bumbling buffoons who don't know how to hold a sword right from the getgo and barely understand "sword sharp" while Wizards can wiggle their fingers and shoot lasers.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
By 7th level all characters will have at least 4 feats. Most martial characters will have more than that. A human fighter will have 9 feats at that level. Any full BAB character with at least a 13 STR can get Great Cleave by 5th level; a fighter can get it by 4th level. By 9th level any full BAB class can have improved surprise follow through; a fighter can get it by 8th level. While 8th level is a fairly high level it is not like it is the end of the campaign. If your games only last till 9th level, you might want to consider looking for a different GM.
The idea that giving free feats to a martial class is going to put them on par with a caster is ridiculous. Fighters are considered one of the worst classes in the game, but they get more feats than anyone. The big complaint about fighter is that they get no decent class abilities, just more feats. So why is giving them even more feats supposed to help them? To make matters worse everyone gets those feats so now the low to medium combat classes can start doing what used to be the province of the martial classes. Instead of bringing the martial classes to be closer to the casters this does the opposite.
If your argument is that martial should be able to do amazing things this does not really accomplish that either. Instead of getting rid of feats why not create a system that actually allows martial classes to do amazing things. Grit, Ki and Panache are a step in the right direction. Another thing that might help would be feats that have a prerequisite of No Caster Level. Even creating more fighter only feats would help as long as they are decent. Most of the fighter only feats are pretty sad.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
The discussion at hand is not whether martials are on par with casters, but whether it's totally unfair if a character has to wait all the way until level 7 ("jumping through hoops") in order to get the trick he built his character for.
I think a lot of this thread has missed this point.
I just opened up the Elephant on the Room rules HERE and it really doesn't talk about Martials vs Casters, or even talk about class balance or game balance at all.
Essentially, the EitR rules seem designed to reduce the monotony that comes with always picking the default most-useful options. They achieve this either by giving you those options for free or reducing the feat cost. The effect of this is that it opens up options early game for characters - particularly martial and hybrid classes - which allows them to diverisfy more or specialize more quickly.
For me the biggest change is that it allows combat maneuvers to be useful for 1-2 feats rather than having to spend 2-10 feats on them. Spending 1 feat in order to have a handful of extra utility options in combat seems like a great way to help combats feel more dynamic and cinematic, and reduce the monotony that comes from "I full attack".
Derklord had a great post about "Character Defining Choices" a couple of years back. Essentially the reason some classes don't feel as deep as others is because the player doesn't really get any meaningful choices in their character's progression from the class. The choices you make as you level up should make your character feel unique and special. The choices themselves should feel meaningful, giving you new options or changing the way your character feels to play.
Looking at feats: Power Attack, Weapon Finesse, Combat Expertise, Dodge, Point Blank Shot - these are all examples of Boring feats. They all make you more effective at combat, but don't really change the way you play. Removing them as feats and giving them back as standard options simply allows characters to use the best options available without dramatically changing their options in combat, and more importantly it opens up their feat slots to make "Character defining choices".
This is important because it helps to define who your character is without "Jumping through Hoops". If you want a character who can do a WHIRLWIND ATTACK you no longer have to spend 5 feats on that single option, you can spend 2. This can mean the difference between taking this feat at level 5 and level 9, which could be MONTHS of game-time . More importantly it frees up 3 of your 5 feats so you can have something to do in combat besides Whirlwind Attack if you want to.
And yes it's good to work toward feats and have goals in mind, but feats still have prerequisites - Whirlwind Attack needs +4 BAB and still requires Spring Attack, which also requires +4 BAB. What it's doing is reducing the number of boring feats required to do something fun and different.
TLDR: All the EitR ruleset does is free up some feats early game so that you can have a more unique-feeling character at an earlier level than would have been available otherwise. You don't really get kore powerful feats , but you do get more options and those options should feel more impactful to how your character feels to play. If you want these rules to do more than that then your expectations are unrealistic .. sorry.
For those who have said "Casters have to wait too, should we give them fireball at level 1?" ... They already have a level-1 Fireball, it's called Burning Hands. Spells already have options and a built in progression that scales with level, which is why this ruleset doesn't address spells. On top of that, spells aren't the same kind of rare Character defining choice that feats are. Even spontaneous casters get multiple spells per level and can retrain out of spells at higher levels when they're no longer useful. Prepared casters can simply pick another spell the next day.
|
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I just opened up the Elephant on the Room rules HERE and it really doesn't talk about Martials vs Casters, or even talk about class balance or game balance at all.
Indeed. We just got sidetracked because some people were claiming it's completely unfair if their character concept isn't fully optimized yet until level 7. I'm well aware that's not what EITR is for.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I just opened up the Elephant on the Room rules HERE and it really doesn't talk about Martials vs Casters, or even talk about class balance or game balance at all.Indeed. We just got sidetracked because some people were claiming it's completely unfair if their character concept isn't fully optimized yet until level 7. I'm well aware that's not what EITR is for.
Yeah. I try to have my characters functional at level 1 and able to use their main schtick by level 5. After that I go into optimization.
It also makes combat more decision heavy.
Exactly. Everything you just said is ideally what you get from the EitR rules. They seem to keep combat more about decisions than just numbers.
|
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32
|
This is a bit misleading because you can have the same use of combat whether or not you use EitR. Take for example Combat Expertise, which you used in your second example, most people refuse to use that ability when they grab it as a feat, nothing about EitR makes people more likely to use it.
Temperans is correct. Sundering or tripping on an AOO, taking an attack penalty for an AC bonus, provoking to avoid a full attack - all of these can be done with zero investment just from Core rules. This has nothing to do with EITR.
MrCharisma post is the first post in this thread to actually have any kind of valid reason for this system. I still don’t think this is something that is really in need of fixing, but I can at least understand and respect this point of view. I don’t accept that this fixes the martial caster disparity or is something everyone should be able to do anyways.
The reason this was never an issue for me is I absolutely despise low level play. To me the most enjoyable part of a 1st level character is writing up the character and figuring out what I am going to do with the character. Coming up with his background and writing up the characters history is often more enjoyable then actually playing them at low level. Once they reach about 3rd to 5th level, they become more interesting. Before that they tend to be too frail and one lucky shot can take out a character. From what I see on the boards the campaigns I run go to a much higher level than most. In my current campaign I am running the party is 16th level and still have a lot to do before the campaign is over.