20 vs 18

[KarinsDad]

True!

It would be much more accurate to say that "4e largely did away with MAD in PHB 2 and 3"

PHB1 has several MAD classes - Starlocks and Paladins being the worst offenders. Heck; if you're restricted to PHB1, any V-shaped class gets hit a bit. Fighters have a bit of MAD, too, needing Strength, Wisdom, and a variable 3rd stat depending on which weapon they're using.

-O

Fighters don't need Wisdom. A Wisdom of 10 will do, 12 if the player wants to have a slight boost to Combat Superiority.

Just because class feature, powers, and feat options are available does not mean that a PC has to be good in all of them. I played a Staff Wizard with a Con of 12 and Wis of 12 who never used his Staff immediate interrupt in 5 levels of play and had Cloud of Daggers and Thunderwave, only doing the 1 point of damage and pushing a foe one square respectively.

I actually consider the A shape PC classes of PHB2 and later to be a weakness of the game system. Instead of people having to make tough ability score decisions as to what they want their PC to do and hence, not every PC is a cookie cutter copy of many others of that class, now a lot of them look similar abliity score-wise.

WotC dummied down the game system. Feats in PHB1 required a player to think ahead of time because of ability score requirements. That has, for the most part, vanished from the game system and I think it's a shame.

Now, most players can get whatever cool class feats that they want for their PC, straight off the optimization boards from the splat books. Even feat chains, for the most part, have gone the way of the dinosaur which I think is a watering down of the system, not a beefing up.

It's probably an issue of increasing the game base size and designing for the least common denominator of player skill and desire to research feats and powers.

 

[Herschel]

WotC dummied down the game system. Feats in PHB1 required a player to think ahead of time because of ability score requirements. That has, for the most part, vanished from the game system and I think it's a shame.

Now, most players can get whatever cool class feats that they want for their PC, straight off the optimization boards from the splat books. Even feat chains, for the most part, have gone the way of the dinosaur which I think is a watering down of the system, not a beefing up.

It's probably an issue of increasing the game base size and designing for the least common denominator of player skill and desire to research feats and powers.

Wow, I'm not sure I could disagree more.

1. Having to plan your character up-and-down from the beginning was something I ABHORED about 3E. Absolutely DETESTED. To me, that sucks all the fun out of developing a character in-game and/or developing it TO the game.

2. It logically also makes people MORE reliant on char-op boards because you have less room for error and you don't have teh flexibility to try different things out yourself.

3. I also dislike feat chains when there's no retraining. That's just an artificial construct to try and gimp characters.

4E is SO much a better character creation system BECAUSE it tried to negate all those pointless traps and pitfalls.

 

[KarinsDad]

Wow, I'm not sure I could disagree more.

1. Having to plan your character up-and-down from the beginning was something I ABHORED about 3E. Absolutely DETESTED. To me, that sucks all the fun out of developing a character in-game and/or developing it TO the game.

2. It logically also makes people MORE reliant on char-op boards because you have less room for error and you don't have teh flexibility to try different things out yourself.

3. I also dislike feat chains when there's no retraining. That's just an artificial construct to try and gimp characters.

4E is SO much a better character creation system BECAUSE it tried to negate all those pointless traps and pitfalls.

Yours is an entitlement argument.

Let's take a simple example. Heavy Blade Mastery.

With your argument, every melee PC should be able to take Heavy Blade Mastery or Axe Mastery or Flail Mastery. Every single melee PC should be allowed to get 19 or 20 criticals with their weapon. Every one.

Hence, the design of these Mastery feats is flawed. I should be able to do so with my 10 Dex Fighter.

I am ENTITLED to have the same 19 to crit that other PCs have. Entitled.

That's really what the "requirements should be weak" POV really boils down to. I am ENTITLED as a player to have all of the best feats I want. The game designers should not have restrictions on the acquisition of the best feats.

Even the retraining argument doesn't hold up too well. If there were a 3 feat chain situation that the player doesn't like, he can retrain feat #3, retrain feat #2, and then retrain feat #1 over 3 levels (if he wanted to go back that far). He can still pretty much get out of such a situation.


A PC doesn't have to be designed to the nth degree ahead of time. It only has to do so if the player wants to powergame his PC with the absolute best feats. The stronger prerequisites were there to reward certain types of builds with certain types of stronger feats. Now, everyone is entitled to those stronger feats. The most restrictive feat limit now is race for the most part. Even class isn't completely restrictive. A single multi-class feat will allow for at least one different class feat.

 

[Nifft]

Yours is an entitlement argument.

I think you are ascribing him a motive which is not in evidence.

Wow, I'm not sure I could disagree more.

1. Having to plan your character up-and-down from the beginning was something I ABHORED about 3E. Absolutely DETESTED. To me, that sucks all the fun out of developing a character in-game and/or developing it TO the game.

2. It logically also makes people MORE reliant on char-op boards because you have less room for error and you don't have teh flexibility to try different things out yourself.

3. I also dislike feat chains when there's no retraining. That's just an artificial construct to try and gimp characters.

4E is SO much a better character creation system BECAUSE it tried to negate all those pointless traps and pitfalls.

4e did greatly increase your "in play" character flexibility via retraining. They reduced, and made very explicit, the things you can't retrain: your ability scores. Your feats are no longer a road full of speed-bumps (like Dodge). Instead, your ability score choices are your obstacles.

With ability score as the only qualification, you effectively choose the feats that are forbidden to you at character generation, and thereafter you're free to pick & retrain from the ones that remain.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Camelot]

While many may tell you that you need an 18-20 to be "good," really an entire party of 16/14, even after racial bonuses, can do fine. What they lose in class power, they gain in versatility. If anyone tries to tell you it's not worth it, that doing better at what you're meant to do is a better choice, don't listen unless you're really looking to powergame and nothing else.

If your DM is pitting you against encounters of a much higher level than you and expecting you to beat them, then you might consider an 18-20/16-18.

 

[Nifft]

While many may tell you that you need an 18-20 to be "good," really an entire party of 16/14, even after racial bonuses, can do fine. What they lose in class power, they gain in versatility. If anyone tries to tell you it's not worth it, that doing better at what you're meant to do is a better choice, don't listen unless you're really looking to powergame and nothing else.

If your DM is pitting you against encounters of a much higher level than you and expecting you to beat them, then you might consider an 18-20/16-18.

16-20 is fine. 14 (post-racial) is not fine.

18 (post-racial) is the default. If you don't want to optimize, just put an 18 (post-racial) in your primary attack stat.

If you do want to optimize, then you can start thinking about what you'd gain by taking a 16 or a 20 instead.

Taking a 16 (post-racial) instead of an 18 can be a munchkin move. It certainly was when an Elf Orb-Wizard did it, before Orb-Wizards got nerfed.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Gradine]

I actually agree with Karins Dad in at least one aspect of his argument; I thought V-shaped classes were a great idea (starlocks aside). Sure, they were restrictive when all you had was the PHB and humans were kind of screwed on that end of that deal. But if you want to talk about versatility; at this point two Clerics can be so much more different from one another than two Bards will ever have the ability to be. It makes build choices much more important than a series of highly situational add-mods.

The A-shaped classes of later manuals, on the other hand, give you double the options true, but at half the range. And when you think about it, each build is going to gravitate towards its own set of powers, so your options are actually just as restricted as a V-shaped character. The difference is that the A-shaped character has more pitfalls; since every power keys off your main stat a player is far more likely to pick up a power that is not at all beneficial to their build.

The problem WotC has is that V-shaped classes are harder sells right out of the box. They need time (and most importantly, Dragon articles and Power Sourcebooks) to fully develop. This is the main reason why they haven't released a V-shaped class since, and likely won't again. It was an interesting design idea that many people liked; but most of their customers won't miss it at all.

 

[Knowme]

Yours is an entitlement argument.

Let's take a simple example. Heavy Blade Mastery.

With your argument, every melee PC should be able to take Heavy Blade Mastery or Axe Mastery or Flail Mastery. Every single melee PC should be allowed to get 19 or 20 criticals with their weapon. Every one.

Hence, the design of these Mastery feats is flawed. I should be able to do so with my 10 Dex Fighter.

I am ENTITLED to have the same 19 to crit that other PCs have. Entitled.

That's really what the "requirements should be weak" POV really boils down to. I am ENTITLED as a player to have all of the best feats I want. The game designers should not have restrictions on the acquisition of the best feats.

Even the retraining argument doesn't hold up too well. If there were a 3 feat chain situation that the player doesn't like, he can retrain feat #3, retrain feat #2, and then retrain feat #1 over 3 levels (if he wanted to go back that far). He can still pretty much get out of such a situation.


A PC doesn't have to be designed to the nth degree ahead of time. It only has to do so if the player wants to powergame his PC with the absolute best feats. The stronger prerequisites were there to reward certain types of builds with certain types of stronger feats. Now, everyone is entitled to those stronger feats. The most restrictive feat limit now is race for the most part. Even class isn't completely restrictive. A single multi-class feat will allow for at least one different class feat.

Why does it have to be an entitlement argument? Why can't it be a mathematical one?

Strikers are balanced around doing certain amounts of damage. Why does it make sense that a new player might find themselves suddenly unable to keep up because of a tertiary stat choice that they might have made for flavor reasons?

 

[Runestar]

What is this V/A shaped character thing? I am guessing it is regarding the extent of their SAD/MAD, but would be nice if someone can confirm it for me.

 

[Nifft]

What is this V/A shaped character thing? I am guessing it is regarding the extent of their SAD/MAD, but would be nice if someone can confirm it for me.

V = divergent (if you start at the bottom and move up).
A = convergent.

Cheers, -- N