D&D General Chris just said why I hate wizard/fighter dynamic

[GMforPowergamers]

Every night when you camp, take a stone from the campsite (and toss the previous night's stone, to avoid confusion and encumbrance issues). Then, at the absolute worst, you're one day from your point of origination. Of course, when you enter a new point of interest, you can also grab the first random object you find, for quick backtracking.

scry and die tactics of 3e and 3.5 and pathfinder disappered in 4e and only made a slight comback in 5e.

having said that teleporting home then coming back isn't super hard either.

saying: Familiarity: "Permanent Circle" means a permanent Teleportation Circle whose sigil sequence you know. "Associated Object" means that you possess an object taken from the desired destination within the last six months, such as a book from a wizard's Library, bed linen from a royal suite, or a chunk of marble from a Lich's Secret tomb.

teleport means you can (if you want to set it up) always be able to get home and 7/10 times get back to where you want or close... worst case you at least have the 54-100 seen causual... but I doubt most times it would be that hard to get something for associated object.

TBH teleporting to somewhere you DON'T know or only scried was always the most impactful part of teleport, and 5e DID nerf that a bit

 

[Fanaelialae]

scry and die tactics of 3e and 3.5 and pathfinder disappered in 4e and only made a slight comback in 5e.

having said that teleporting home then coming back isn't super hard either.

saying: Familiarity: "Permanent Circle" means a permanent Teleportation Circle whose sigil sequence you know. "Associated Object" means that you possess an object taken from the desired destination within the last six months, such as a book from a wizard's Library, bed linen from a royal suite, or a chunk of marble from a Lich's Secret tomb.

teleport means you can (if you want to set it up) always be able to get home and 7/10 times get back to where you want or close... worst case you at least have the 54-100 seen causual... but I doubt most times it would be that hard to get something for associated object.

TBH teleporting to somewhere you DON'T know or only scried was always the most impactful part of teleport, and 5e DID nerf that a bit

True enough, though I'm not clear how scry and die is pertinent. The discussion was regarding teleport as an escape spell.

Even if you don't have an associated object, you can teleport to a very familiar place (like the previous night's campsite, if you took the time to study it) with a 75% chance of success. There's a 25% chance of being 1-100% of the distance off target. Given that the campsite is probably about 20 miles away, that means that you'll (on average) be 10 miles away from the campsite, even if you roll the 25% chance. At most, you'll be 20 miles off. Inconvenient, but in the majority of cases not an overwhelming challenge for a party that's high enough level to cast teleport.

Although, I'd just grab an associated object every day and eliminate the possibility of the inconvenience. Because why not?

 

[FrogReaver]

I'm sure I will get accused of "white room" theory crafting...

how do you calculate non damage causeing spells into combat encounters?

There are a number of ways. My personal favorite is to determine how much damage the control spell saved you. This is a metric that can also be used for extra single target damage and even AOE damage.

On average a 2nd level hold person won't affect an enemy very many rounds (especially with it's initial miss chance factored in). So it doesn't take much damage to actually equal the impact of a typical level 2 hold person. What is typically noticed in my experience is when the spell works and keeps working it trivializes encounters, but this is selective memory IMO as it's rarely remembered when it failed to work altogether.

So Save-or-suck is the idea that you have to succeed or it's terrible usually when we're talking about it with spells what it means is “I cast a certain spell” *gestures forward with his hand” and the enemy has to make a save and if the don't it's really really bad but if the do nothing really happens

so hold person/hold monster can take a monster out of the encounter for 1+ rounds....

Or do nothing.

in a campaign (and forget white room I have played in and run such games) where half or more of the high level encounters were 'non monster' monsters (hobgoblins, humans, elfs, dwarfs, dragonborn)

suggestion, Hideous laughter, and web can all incapacitate in one way or another a target.

Hideous Laughter isn't any better than a level 2 hold person. Web is a bit better due to the AOE. But it doesn't actually disable it just restrains which for some enemies might be effectively the same thing but for many it won't be either.

at low levels casters can only do this 1 or 2 times a day and it eats into there ability to do other things. at mid levels these are pittance costs.

higher level ones are worst... banishment has been used SO many times to just end non legendary encounters (both by me and my PCs)

so the fighter can throw a ton of damage, and can hit well, the wizard can (with cantrips) throw about 1/2 that damage with the same ratio to hit, a warlock can keep up with the fighter at will... but ON TOP of that they can cast monster ending spells.

A wizard doesn't get anywhere near 1/2 the fighters damage with a cantrip. The fighter has some combination ofsubclass features/action surges/magic weapons/buffs/feats/etc that all increases the fighters damage far above twice a wizard cantrip.

I'm all for agreeing the wizard is stronger especially in late game, but give the Fighter his due.

is there anything a fighter can do as powerful as this first level spell "The target must succeed on a Wisdom saving throw or fall prone, becoming incapacitated and unable to stand up for the duration."

Yes. He can attack and kill the enemy. Dead is the best condition.

at 20th level a fighter can swing 4 times action surge swing 4 more times and second wind to get 1d10+20hp back... 8 attacks and heal is most likely the best round of combat a fighter will ever have (giving a 22 str +3 weapon and power attacking (and remember that is -5 to hit) that is 2d6+19 reroll 1's and 2's so minimum damage is 25 per hit max is 31) the best round a 1st level wizard can have is targeting someone with a -1 wis save with laugh and having a DC 12 so they need a 13+ to make the save (60% chance it lands and 60% chance it lasts a second round) taking a monster right out of the fight even if they have 10,000hp

It's not even remotely the same thing. I fully agree control is good. It's strong. But IMO it isn't to the level you are making it out to be.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

True enough, though I'm not clear how scry and die is pertinent. The discussion was regarding teleport as an escape spell.

Even if you don't have an associated object, you can teleport to a very familiar place (like the previous night's campsite, if you took the time to study it) with a 75% chance of success. There's a 25% chance of being 1-100% of the distance off target. Given that the campsite is probably about 20 miles away, that means that you'll (on average) be 10 miles away from the campsite, even if you roll the 25% chance. At most, you'll be 20 miles off. Inconvenient, but in the majority of cases not an overwhelming challenge for a party that's high enough level to cast teleport.

Although, I'd just grab an associated object every day and eliminate the possibility of the inconvenience. Because why not?

yeah, especially if home is half aworld away... (useing real world geography) if I camp in New York state 10 miles from the orc camp, get into a fight at the orc camp and need to regroup, I can teleport the whole party home to Germany, take 2-3 days and teleport back to that campsite (or worst case 20ish miles from it) now repreped and ready. in 2-3 days a party without a caster can go like 50-70 miles at best.

the diffrence between having a caster and not is HUGE

 

[tetrasodium]

True enough, though I'm not clear how scry and die is pertinent. The discussion was regarding teleport as an escape spell.

Even if you don't have an associated object, you can teleport to a very familiar place (like the previous night's campsite, if you took the time to study it) with a 75% chance of success. There's a 25% chance of being 1-100% of the distance off target. Given that the campsite is probably about 20 miles away, that means that you'll (on average) be 10 miles away from the campsite, even if you roll the 25% chance. At most, you'll be 20 miles off. Inconvenient, but in the majority of cases not an overwhelming challenge for a party that's high enough level to cast teleport.

Although, I'd just grab an associated object every day and eliminate the possibility of the inconvenience. Because why not?

Nobody said that you couldn't find an object associated with someplace else, just that the bar is higher than what amounts to a daily ritual of "Eeny, meeny, miny, moe that one" each morning. The part that got you into trouble is thinking that you could do it each day to limit how far you jump back & deny the gm any say in what counts as good choices through mincing strict raw.

 

[FrogReaver]

Nobody said that you couldn't find an object associated with someplace else, just that the bar is higher than what amounts to a daily ritual of "Eeny, meeny, miny, moe that one" each morning. The part that got you into trouble is thinking that you could do it each day to limit how far you jump back & deny the gm any say in what counts as good choices through mincing strict raw.

DM fiat can stop anything and they can always insert some fictional justification for it to be the case. If your players are fine playing that way then great! IMO. Most are going to walk away when you start using your fiat to constantly block their ideas.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Here is how I ended our 20th level campaign, showing what a powerful wizard is capable of doing.

Spoiler

The BBEG was a 20th level wizard with a simulacrum. The party consisted of the following:

Half-orc Fighter/Rogue 15/15
Dragonborn Barbarian/Fighter 15/15
Dragonborn Sorcerer/Druid 15/15
Human Paladin/Cleric 15/15
Human Monk/Druid/Wizard 12/12/12
Half-elf Bard/Monk 15/15
High Elf Cleric/Rogue/Wizard 12/12/12

We did a variant of old school multiclassing, so each PC had the experience required to be equal to a 19-20th level character. With our MC rules, each had 19-20 HD, not 15 or 12 as you might think.

The final "adventure" (worth about 600,000 xp) was being summoned to the wizard's island domain and defeating numerous powerful foes before assaulting the wizard's stronghold. They found and destroyed the wizard's clone before defeating his simulacrum, which they believed was actually him. The wizard toyed with them prior to all this, using his magic to restore to life to two of the PCs who died against some of the wizard's minions and traps. It took six sessions (8-10 hours each) to finish it.

Sadly, the game ended with them believing they had won. They never even fought the wizard, only his simulacrum. Little do they know the NPC warlock who was helping them was actually the wizard. By helping the PCs recover his love, the Elven noblewoman, from the vile "wizard" and "defeating" the wizard, the wizard has really positioned himself well to marry the noblewoman and eventually take over the Elven Court, solidifying his world power even more.

The entire quest for the PCs was a ruse for the wizard to gain even more power. The players believe they have won, but this twist leaves it open for me to bring those PCs back for some "epic" adventures...

No other class could really come close to doing what that wizard was capable of, certainly no non-caster!

The power curve for caster vs. non-caster is still very large, especially for wizards. Whether you see that as an issue or not just depends on your style of play and how balanced you feel the classes should be.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

There are a number of ways. My personal favorite is to determine how much damage the control spell saved you. This is a metric that can also be used for extra single target damage and even AOE damage.

yeah, I had someone a few years ago (maybe 10) call control preempitve healing and calculated the damage the enemy could do in the missed action/actions as if it was healing.

On average a 2nd level hold person won't affect an enemy very many rounds (especially with it's initial miss chance factored in).

I mean that depends on the save DC and the modifier of the save... some CR10+ till have 8 wis and are not prof... it is crazy (one reason I liked 4e everything scales)

So it doesn't take much damage to actually equal the impact of a typical level 2 hold person. What is typically noticed in my experience is when the spell works and keeps working it trivializes encounters, but this is selective memory IMO as it's rarely remembered when it failed to work altogether.

The most memorable experience I have is the time it kept failing.

Spoiler

in 3.5 we had someone who wanted to be the OP optimized wizard and preped almost nothing but SoD and SoS spells... and the DM made so many saves to no effect... like "Darn I only have a +3 will save I need a 19 to make that" followed by a 19... it was memorable becuse it was so strange... we had gotten used to even non optimized spell casters getting 50% SoD effects off but that was 2 editions ago

Spoiler

however that 'rare' take a monster out of the encounter is something that happens... and if a wizard can take a threat out with a single 1st level spells no matter the hitpoints 5% of the time that is already cutting into the fighter being best at combat a little (and I don't belive a well played wizard, not even optimized just well built/played has only a 5% chance of it)

Or do nothing.

right and last night my level 7 armor artificer (yeah not a fighter but our front line combatant in this game) made 3 attacks per round (thunder punch, thunder punch, bonus action off hand thunder punch) 2 rounds in a row and missed all 6 attacks... it's rare for me with my 19 Int (head band of int... well crown but it's a long story) to miss all my attacks in 1 round let alone 2, but it still was 'do nothing' just as much as if the wizard threw 2 SoD/SoS spells and they made the saves.

Hideous Laughter isn't any better than a level 2 hold person.

this is a problem with spell levels and some getting legacy levels as well (maybe beyond @HammerMan thread) because why is a 1st level spell no better then a 2nd but no worse either... shouldn't the 2nd level spell automatically be better?

A wizard doesn't get anywhere near 1/2 the fighters damage with a cantrip.

it depends on the fighter build and the wizard build... but multi D12's from toll the dead can easily match a longsword and shield fighter let alone be half...

fighter makeing 3 attacks for 1d8+4 damage per hit (3d8+12 25 if all three hit) compaired to the wizard doing 3d12 necrotic 13 damage seems to me to be just at half... and the wizard only needs 1 roll to 'hit' (it's a save) the fighter needs 3

another problem (and why I hate crit fumble rules) is the more dice you need to roll the more low numbers you will get (in theory 50% of the time you should roll less then 11 and 5% of the time you should get a 1)

if over the course of 100 combat rounds you rely on 100 rolls you should be counting on 1-9 (bad roll to hit good roll if someone is saving vs your effect) 45 times. if you rely on 300 rolls you will have that 1-9 135 times...

now this bites the wizard too... the fighter at level 5 makes 2 attacks and the wizard uses everyone's favorite spell FIREBALL and catchs 4 enemies in it... that is 4 saves for half. However baring a few outliers that is still half damage where a miss form the fighter is 0 damage.

The fighter has some combination ofsubclass features/action surges/magic weapons/buffs/feats/etc that all increases the fighters damage far above twice a wizard cantrip.

um... doesn't the wizard ALSO have subclass features/class features/ magic implments/ buffs/ feats ect that increase the damage? why count the fighter stuff and not the wizard...

I also notice we skipped the warlock part.

eldritch blast is 1 2 3 and 4 attacks and with 1/7th your invocations can add your cha to damage... at that point that caster at will has 1d10+magic+buff+stat and that is equal to a fighter with a d10 weapon (better then one with a d8 weapon but not as good as one with a d12 or 2d6 weapon...but real close)

warlocks still have 2-4 1st-5th level spell slots per short rest, and 0-4 6th+ slots (depending on level)

I'm all for agreeing the wizard is stronger especially in late game, but give the Fighter his due.

yeah, the fighter is cool with average damage. In a given round I am 70% sure that a fighter (especially after 3 attacks come online) can do more single target damage. that other 30% of the time the caster had to use a big resource to deal more damage.

Yes. He can attack and kill the enemy. Dead is the best condition.

no... the wizard can take a cr100 1,000,000,000 hp target out if they fail there save. is that likely (no), is it possible (yes)

what is WAY more probable and likely is at level 1 the wizard can take out 1 target and the fighter can take out 1 target... the problem is at level 5+ monster hp goes up faster then fighter damage (outside of the most optimized builds) but that wizard still can in some fights 1 shot to a weak save.

It's not even remotely the same thing. I fully agree control is good. It's strong. But IMO it isn't to the level you are making it out to be.

1st this is a team based game so the wizard control does work best when teamed with a damage dealer. However 2 casters can speck out 1 control 1 damage. 2 martial classes can not. there is no control.

 

[Fanaelialae]

Nobody said that you couldn't find an object associated with someplace else, just that the bar is higher than what amounts to a daily ritual of "Eeny, meeny, miny, moe that one" each morning. The part that got you into trouble is thinking that you could do it each day to limit how far you jump back & deny the gm any say in what counts as good choices through mincing strict raw.

Even @Maxperson agreed that a branch from a tree would be valid. It was one of the examples he provided, which we ultimately agreed on. We simply disagreed as to whether a stone would be valid.

In any case, as @GMforPowergamers pointed out, the 25% chance of being off site isn't exactly a big deal. The only thing the object eliminates is a minor inconvenience.

Deny the GM? I AM a GM. I was literally describing how I would run it, and how I believe it should be run, based on RAW (as well as good GMing practices).

 

[Oofta]

yeah, especially if home is half aworld away... (useing real world geography) if I camp in New York state 10 miles from the orc camp, get into a fight at the orc camp and need to regroup, I can teleport the whole party home to Germany, take 2-3 days and teleport back to that campsite (or worst case 20ish miles from it) now repreped and ready. in 2-3 days a party without a caster can go like 50-70 miles at best.

the diffrence between having a caster and not is HUGE

So if it would take several weeks or months to get from A to B, how often would that come up in a campaign? Wouldn't that become most of the campaign? First, there's nothing wrong with that. I limit teleportation and planar travel for multiple reasons in my campaign. So if the group needs to get from A to B we either hand-wave it because it's not particularly dangerous, we play through it and it becomes a focal point for a while. Most of the time we do a hybrid. "You've been travelling for a week and see smoke rising from over the ridge and hear war drums." Then something interesting happens or the group figures out how to avoid it all.

But in game it doesn't really matter. It might come up as a nice get out of jail free card now and then, but if you're in a literal jail teleportation is probably been blocked anyway. Take away teleportation and the game changes slightly. Include it and make it useful? It's practically a spell tax.

EDIT: I also have alternative means of fast(er) travel, but I always want going from point A to B to be interesting with decisions to make and possible danger if A and B are a significant distance apart. I just think teleportation is boring and knowing the sequence for random teleportation circles doesn't make sense either.