Fighters didn't matter after 11th level?

[Mournblade94]

Ritual magic significantly helps return the feel. Part of the problem with 4E (for me) is the need to make a bunch of powers to fill a bunch of books, which result in many kind of feeling the same. Double so if you ignore the ritual magic (which are, IMO, the true utility powers).

I have not played everysystem by a long shot. The wizard/fighter argument has come up in every fantasy system I played except HERO and WFRP.

Even my LARP has a constant argument about how powerful casters are to warriors.

What it seems 4e did is make everyone a wizard. Everyone has spells. Some have ranged spells, some have melee spells, but essentially when broken down to nucleotides, everyone was made a wizard.

A fighter is a melee battle wizard, a wizard is a support wizard. Call powers what you want but they are really all spells.

 

[Mournblade94]

In the first two editions however, the caster was often rendered useless, by interrupting his casting with a normal attack. I did not like this addition in 3rd edition because I thought they eliminated an important balance factour.

In the previous editions, my players always managed to gimp my uber villain caster in the midst of casting.

I also did it to the PC whan I could.

Caster Interruption was really one of the important balances to the caster. This was largely (if not completely) eliminated in 3rd edition.

 

[ExploderWizard]

It was a little more difficult for casters to dominate play in older (pre 3E) games. Removing the requirement to announce spell use prior to initiative and a lot of of the danger of having a spell disrupted did more to raise the power of casters than just about anything else.

Sure that sleep spell was super powerful but if you lost initiative and got shot before it went off (even odds with a simple d6 initiative check) then the fighter carried the day. At higher levels it was the same. Casters were always primary targets for the nastiest spells and effects.

Instead of fixing this basic problem in 3.5 the designers instead decided that weakening the effects/durations of spells would solve the issue. This did little to tone down the effectiveness of casters on the tactical level, it just forced them to burn up more resources to achieve the same results which contributed to the 15 minute workday issue.

Casting spells in the thick of battle was always intended to be risky and uncertain. Removing that basic element helped turn the magic dominance dial to eleven.

 

[billd91]

It was a little more difficult for casters to dominate play in older (pre 3E) games. Removing the requirement to announce spell use prior to initiative and a lot of of the danger of having a spell disrupted did more to raise the power of casters than just about anything else.

I'm not actually convinced declaring the spell before rolling initiative has that big an effect in the trenches where the game is commonly played. One of the things 3e did when it came out was include some elements of how people actually play. I encountered more groups that just had the wizard pick the spell when his initiative came around rather than hold to a decision before initiative was rolled.

But I do think that the difference between getting hit before your turn in 2e and 3e has more of an effect I've noticed. If you hit the caster before the spell went off in the same round, you were assumed to have disrupted his actual cast time. That's not there in 3e. You actually have to hit him during his casting action and then he gets a concentration save to boot, and that means you either have to have a held action or the wizard has to be within reach and failing to cast defensively. Clearly, this narrows the window of opportunity to disrupt a spell.

 

[jasin]

Call powers what you want but they are really all spells.

How so? Because of the format in which they're presented? Because they're limited-use?

 

[Ourph]

This depends on what spells the spellcaster relies on and uses. I always tailor encounters to my player characters. But if I know the wizard has access to things like fireball, I may throw something at them that will be weakened by things like fire. Anytime you throw a flying creature into the mix, wizards are prone to unleash a bunch of spells. A large number of really weak opponents also is good. Most wizards can't resist an opportnity to use their area of effect spells. Its more about anticipating what spells your players will throw at what creatures. With any player, you learn what spells they rely on; and you adapt.

Mid to high level casters are going to be doing casting each round anyway, because they have the resources to do so. Throwing encounters at the party that can only be affected by magic isn't going to deplete the casters any faster because they are still limited to one action per round. Yes, the combats may last a little longer in this case because the non-casters are sitting around twiddling their thumbs (another problem with this scenario), but the main thing you'll be depleting in this scenario isn't offensive magic, it's the HPs of the casters and healing spells. If the casters are the only ones hurting the foes to any extent, then it makes sense for the foes to focus their attacks on the squishy Wizard and perhaps also the Cleric. Again, you've just made the encounter harder for the melee guys because their options are to 1) throw their bodies in front of the casters in an attempt to protect them, despite being unable to really harm the foes; or 2) stand back and hope the casters finish the bad guys before healing runs out, because if the casters go down, the encounter is going to be a TPK.

I'm still not seeing a scenario here where it's possible to deplete the casters of spell resources without hosing the melee guys in the process unless the players cooperate to make it happen.

 

[Krensky]

But I do think that the difference between getting hit before your turn in 2e and 3e has more of an effect I've noticed. If you hit the caster before the spell went off in the same round, you were assumed to have disrupted his actual cast time. That's not there in 3e. You actually have to hit him during his casting action and then he gets a concentration save to boot, and that means you either have to have a held action or the wizard has to be within reach and failing to cast defensively. Clearly, this narrows the window of opportunity to disrupt a spell.

Something I mean to try the next time I run a D&D game to address this was to increase the base Defensive casting DC to 20, and adjust casting interruption so it requires a concentration roll equal to 10 (or 15) + the amount of damage taken since the end of your last round. This may need adjustment to the highest damage from a single attack.

 

[Mournblade94]

How so? Because of the format in which they're presented? Because they're limited-use?

The powers in 4e fill the roles that spells filled in previous editions. The wizard had his basic attack but the core of the class was the vast amount of spells he had.

Now, regardless of class, there is the basic attack and then the core of the class... the list of powers (spells). Each power within class has a variable effect following a theme.

I realize the fluff of the powers is not that of spells. A shift of several squares however is mechanically the same as a push effect from a spell.

Essentially, the spells of previous edition wizards, the core of that class, was added to be the core of every class.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Something I mean to try the next time I run a D&D game to address this was to increase the base Defensive casting DC to 20, and adjust casting interruption so it requires a concentration roll equal to 10 (or 15) + the amount of damage taken since the end of your last round. This may need adjustment to the highest damage from a single attack.

These adjustments won't do anything to really affect casting reliability. Increasing the defensive casting DC is meaningless if the caster is careful and rarely has to cast defensively. The casting interruption thing might punish casters a bit too much since the concentration check to cast at all will become nigh impossible at high levels.

 

[Krensky]

These adjustments won't do anything to really affect casting reliability. Increasing the defensive casting DC is meaningless if the caster is careful and rarely has to cast defensively. The casting interruption thing might punish casters a bit too much since the concentration check to cast at all will become nigh impossible at high levels.

At my table (or rather, in my group since it happen with other GM's too) this isn't much of an issue since defensive casting comes up semi-regularly. A tendency to focus on urban and interior environments may have something to do with this, I'm not sure.

As for 'punishing' casters, isn't that kind of the point? I have not done numbers but how would a high level wizard getting smacked for a pile of damage and failing the concentration roll be any different then a 2e wizard getting smacked and not being able to cast at all that round? Admittedly, it's been more then a decade since I opened my 2e PHB, so I may be misremembering the rule there.