How is the Wizard vs Warrior Balance Problem Handled in Fantasy Literature?

[billd91]

The Druid being the other 9th level divine caster in the PHB who can cast Heal. And in AD&D a subclass of cleric...

Which is really just saying it's hard to get through without some form of magical healing. Just like it's hard to get through without some way of finding and disabling traps. Or opening locked doors. Or identifying magic items. And so on.

But thanks to having other classes (like the druid, whom I might add, doesn't normally heal spontaneously nor gimp undead - the other major reason most parties include a cleric), the party was able to achieve the things a cleric would bring via other classes - a party configuration without a cleric. And that's precisely my point.

Ultimately, they used teamwork to get through the campaign and did so without the "my class is better than your class" dangly body part comparisons that seems to be inherent in these caster vs non-caster debates.

 

[TwoSix]

It's not enough for y'all that a fighter be interesting to play, and a contributor to a D&D party, in the game as it's intended to be played.

If the game is intended to be played a certain way (and I think the intention for D&D is tough-as-nails fighters, problem-solving thieves, healing clerics, and blasty wizards), then why do the rules support a play method that's opposed to the intention?

 

[billd91]

Exactly. This is my chain of thought on the matter, I'd appreciate seeing where people differ so I can figure out why there's such a disconnect.

1) D&D is both a game and a social exercise.
2) We play D&D for both elements.
3) The point of socializing is to have fun.
4) The point of a game is to challenge ourselves and thus achieve satisfaction from our mastery of the game's required skill set.
5) Proving mastery can only be obtained by comparison to measurable criteria. In D&D, these criteria are encounters.
6) The socializing skill set of D&D is distinct from the "game mechanic" skill set of D&D.
7) The game mechanic skill set has a character building skill subset and a table-play skill subset.
8) One demonstrates mastery of the entire "game mechanic" skill set by overcoming encounters(table-play) with a character you've designed (character building).
9) D&D is a team game.
10) The goal of a team is to prove mastery of the game's skill set.
11) In D&D, the effectiveness of a team is measured by defeating encounters.
12) To demonstrate mastery of the character building skill subset, one should make a character that contributes to the team.
13) The team will be most successful at overcoming encounters the more skill sets the character can provide via his character building.
14) The skill set of a team is not just the sum of individual skill sets, but also the sum of all synergies of overlapping skill sets.
15) Providing more options provides more synergies.
16) Necessary skill sets in D&D are damage, damage mitigation, encounter control, and narrative control. Every ability provides or modifies these base sets.
17) Fighters provide high damage and moderate personal damage mitigation.
18) Wizards provide moderate-to-high damage, high damage mitigation (blur, mirror image, invisibility), high encounter control (fly, invisibility, solid fog), and extremely high narrative control (teleport, scry, planar binding, astral projection).
19) By providing all required skill sets, a wizard provides only benefits to the party.

I think some of your steps in your thought chain are excessively mechanistic. Number 4, for example, may describe some element of why we might play a game, but it misses that the point of the game play itself is not merely to derive satisfaction from winning but also to have fun. What happens if you're failing to show mastery because you're losing a game? Isn't it possible you're still having fun?

Once #4 has such an important gap, I think you can see how others down the line would have them as well. I'm not saying that the chain doesn't describe your approach to the game, but I can guarantee you it doesn't describe everybody's. Frankly, if that were my approach, I'd feel kind of empty. It's very cold, devoid of art. It's like replacing my creativity and imagination with some kind of algorithm with an inherent assumption geared toward maximization (#13) that also wouldn't fit everybody's approach to the game.

 

[billd91]

If the game is intended to be played a certain way (and I think the intention for D&D is tough-as-nails fighters, problem-solving thieves, healing clerics, and blasty wizards), then why do the rules support a play method that's opposed to the intention?

Because not everyone is Gygax and his original table of cronies (or Arneson and his original table of cronies).

Are you seriously questioning why an RPG might appeal or try to appeal to a broad market of people with differing tastes in play?

 

[TwoSix]

Ultimately, they used teamwork to get through the campaign and did so without the "my class is better than your class" dangly body part comparisons that seems to be inherent in these caster vs non-caster debates.

I'm really not sure what you mean by that. No one on the "casters are better" side of the debate are happy about caster superiority. It's not like "Neener, neener, you fighter players are so duuuummmbbb."

We simply want to be able to play any class without feeling like we have to play poorly to not come across as game-wrecking douchebags.

 

[TwoSix]

I think some of your steps in your thought chain are excessively mechanistic. Number 4, for example, may describe some element of why we might play a game, but it misses that the point of the game play itself is not merely to derive satisfaction from winning but also to have fun. What happens if you're failing to show mastery because you're losing a game? Isn't it possible you're still having fun?

Once #4 has such an important gap, I think you can see how others down the line would have them as well. I'm not saying that the chain doesn't describe your approach to the game, but I can guarantee you it doesn't describe everybody's. Frankly, if that were my approach, I'd feel kind of empty. It's very cold, devoid of art. It's like replacing my creativity and imagination with some kind of algorithm with an inherent assumption geared toward maximization (#13) that also wouldn't fit everybody's approach to the game.

#4 says the point is to show mastery, not to win. Do you play games to intentionally lose? If you're in the process of playing a game, and you do something in-game to amuse your friends, you're drawing pleasure from the social aspect, not the game aspect.

Think of playing a board game. I'll assume that there are times when you play the game and are unconcerned with the game's victory conditions. I do that all the time. You may be screwing with an unconventional strategy. That's still showing your mastery over the system, because you know enough about the game to know conventional from unconventional. Playing a new game shows mastery, because at the end, you've learned a skill you didn't have before.

The point of a game is to play the game. But the only way that you're playing is to be engaged with the game. And that's because there's a very primal aspect of our nature that rewards you for engaging with a system.

 

[MrMyth]

My point is that a well-played "wizard" (which incl. clerics and druids) can, quite easily, make having a fighter around fairly irrelevant -that a party would, generally, be better off ditching the fighter and adding another Cleric.

At high levels, this becomes even more extreme.

I know this because I have done it before.

A story that (these days) my group tends to laugh about quite a bit:

A friend is running a high-level D&D one-shot. I decide to play a cleric, because I've never played one at high levels before! And I think it will be awesome.

Another friend is playing a rogue, or duelist type, or someone designed to use sneak attack or crits or similar bonuses. And as we go exploring this evil temple we fight... some golem constructs. Which he can't do much about. And then some water elements. Again, can't do much other than try and bounce in and out and stay alive. But the DM assures him, the adventure does have enemies who he will excel against.

Eventually, we reach the final encounter, and are swarmed by the high cultist and his various minions. Human minions!

And my cleric wins initiative, and not even realizing what would happen, I try out my high level spell - Holy Word.

And in a single standard action, kill/disable every enemy in the adventure vulnerable to sneak attack.

(The High Cultist survived, of course. And happened to be wearing Heavy Fortification Armor...)

Now, this specific story wasn't about one character being useless or not - there are plenty of ways to address that (in this specific instance) by adjusting the adventure itself.

But the point is that it doesn't take a drive to 'be the best' for one PC to overshadow another. This guy wasn't optimized or designed to be the best - he was just a high level cleric with the Good domain, and that give him a spell (at +1 caster level!) that trivialized what my companion could contribute in the adventure.

 

[TwoSix]

Because not everyone is Gygax and his original table of cronies (or Arneson and his original table of cronies).

Are you seriously questioning why an RPG might appeal or try to appeal to a broad market of people with differing tastes in play?

You did see I was quoting someone who used the phrase "as the game is intended to be played"?

 

[billd91]

I'm really not sure what you mean by that. No one on the "casters are better" side of the debate are happy about caster superiority. It's not like "Neener, neener, you fighter players are so duuuummmbbb."

We simply want to be able to play any class without feeling like we have to play poorly to not come across as game-wrecking douchebags.

You don't have to play poorly to not be a glory hog. If there's a rogue in the party who wants to invest in opening locks, don't plan to rely on knock. Or if he says he's interested in investing his skill points elsewhere, go ahead with the knock wand. Coordinate your builds and plans to complement each other, not dominate the encounter.

From what I'm seeing here, you approach the game as if it's all about problem solving - defeating the encounter as efficiently as possible. But some players don't approach the game like that. I think it's a lot of fun to roll crits as a fighter and I know a lot of other players who have fun just slinging the dice to see what happens rather than try to find the fastest way to defeat the encounter. If you've got fellow players like that and you're always trying hit the "win button", you're pretty much swinging your dangly bit without caring about the teamwork involved in having a fun game regardless of whether you took out the bad guys in the fastest way or not.

 

[billd91]

You did see I was quoting someone who used the phrase "as the game is intended to be played"?

Yes I did. And that I also noticed that Jeff's comment was about playing an interesting character and contributing to the game. It's hard to argue that's not a very broad way the game is intended to be played, nor is it hard to find that controversial. Everyone at the table should be able to play an interesting character and contribute - that the game supports a variety of ways to do that isn't a shortcoming. Nor is it really limited to tough as nails fighters, problem solving thiefs, blasting wizards, and healing wizards.