AllisterH said:
So how many 3E "problems" would have a cascade effect on the system?
Primitive Screwhead said:
Not all problems were systemic in nature. The 3.0 Haste and Harm spells, are good examples. Replacing save or screwed spells with Save and Screwed until you make a successful Save are also not so bad. Turn Undead is another problem spot that is hardly systemic.
There are some problems that are truly systemic, however. I would say there are 2 systemic problems that lead to about 5 distinct difficulties with D&D.
Too Many Variables: Figuring out the attack bonus, damage, and saves of a 17th level Fighter with a full allotment of level appropriate items was not difficult, even when you figure in the iterative attacks. Where it did get difficult was in figuring out what it was on the 4th round when you had been hit with a Strength and Dex draining effect, a Con Boost, were slowed, had been disarmed and forced to use a non specialized weapon, and were subjected to a Bless spell. You now have to recompute your Attack, Damage, and saves mid fight, probably more than once.
Too Much Work: A consequence of Too Many Variables is that creating and running high level characters is difficult. The players only have to track one. The DM has to create and run a lot more than one. For DM's who do not mind dungeon crawls, the Monsterous Manual solves this nicely with lots of monsters for a wide range of levels. For DM's who like having classed NPC's for the players to interact with, the Monsterous Manual is not much help.
Not all things Improve Equally: The more insidious problem is that not everything improves at the same rate. Some stats improve much faster than others, creating a gap between a good rate and a bad rate which causes problems at higher levels. Even worse, one of the most important combat stats, Armour Class, does not improve at all as you level, being equipment dependant. This causes the following problems.
Fighter Bab vs Level Appropriate AC: At higher levels, you end up in a situation where one of the following happens.
- Only the fighters initial and maybe 2nd Iterative attack can hit. The Rogue, Monk, and Cleric always misses.
- The Fighter will hit with every attack except maybe his 3rd or 4th iterative attack.
Weak Save always Fails: At about the same time as the Fighter Bab problem crops up, the saving throw discrepancy becomes bad enough that Spell vs Weak Save will almost always fail. This is an issue for everyone except perhaps a High Cha Paladin and the Monk. And no one will take the Monk because by the time the good saves would kick ass, no one is using him because of the Flurry of Misses (see previous point).
Big 6 Christmas Tree: While HP and Weak Saves do not improve fast enough to keep pace with level appropriate challenges, magic items can help. The problem is that everyone will end up needing exactly the same magic items. And if your using classed opponents, this means your players will get quite a collection of these items. That covers only half the christmas tree though. The other half of the christmas tree is generally used to make other problems worse. Fighters will pump their attack and damage, and spell casters will pump their save DC's.
There is one non systemic problem that is nearly as bad as the systemic problems, however.
Completely Broken CR system:
The best proofs of this is the Monster Summoning III spell and Undead. Take a look at that list of beasts. Some sound pretty decent, like Hell hounds and various small elementals. Then you have the Fiendish Ape and the Celestial Bison. These are template creatures with low AC and a huge amount of HP. They have just enough hit dice for their template to give them Damage Reduction magic / 5. This makes them much more powerful than everything else on that list, but they are all the same CR.
Undead are another tricky one. They are unusually powerful, with immunity to Sneak Attack and Critical Hit, most Charm spells, and the d12 as hit dice. They often have nasty draining powers. Very difficult, unless you have a cleric. Then they just run the hell away or blow up.
Fixing the CR system is not the sort of thing that would require a whole lot of tinkering with the rest of the game, however.
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