Class Imbalance?

[Mal Malenkirk]

Sorcerers are strong. IME they usually come across as stronger than wizards but that's mostly because Wizard's players often do not adapt their spell selection enough from day to day in order to meet the challenges and they tend to neglect their scribe scroll feat more than they should. (A Wizard who doesn't carry on average 2 useful spell on scrolls for each level he has before going on an adventure is a damn fool IMO)

As for being boring : There's no such thing as a boring class, there are only boring players.

All I ask from a class is that it be strong enough to allow the PC to carry his share of the burden during the adventure. The cure to boredom is roleplaying, not class abilities.

 

[Pax]

I noticed you only have 1 "Class Ability" for the Sorcerer. I think you are missing some...

The have a familiar
They are allowed to swap out spells every other level... So that adds up to what? like 8 or 10 right there?
They can cast spells "on the fly" unlike a Wizard.

I wouldn't count every opportunity to swap a spell out as a seperate class ability. Otherwise, we'd have to add []infinite[/b] class abilities to every non-spontaneous spellcaster, to reflect the fact that they can change their minds every game day -- wizards needing to spend coin to do so, of course, but aside from that ...

I also noticed that, for spells known, you have the Sorcerer at 4 spells per level? Am I reading that correctly? And the Wizard at 37/SL (does that mean 37 spells per spell level?). I think the important factor is how many of those spells can one prepare and cast. You could know 1 million different spells, but what good is it going to do you if you can only prepare and/or cast just 3 of them (per spell level)? I very well may be reading that wrong though...

No, how many spells you knoiw is an important factor -- regardless of how many you can cast in a day, or not.

Anecdote: my first 3E character was a Sorceror. The DM was running us through the second of the early 3E modules ... Forge of Fury or the like, I forget the name ATM ... and in it, there is a young black dragon.

I, of course, had no idea it was there. I'd just gotten to 5th level, and selected Melf's Acid Arrow as my second level 2 spell (my only other of that level was Glitterdust). Lo! and behold, we found the dragon, weren't found BY the dragon, and withdrew ... the next day, the party went in loaded for bear, all specifically optimised for the one foe (and shaking in our boots, not sure at that time what a 3E dragon could DO to us) ... except me. Yep, there I was, with no applicable combat spell (I had sleep, grease, mage armor, glitterdust, and MAA ... none of which was going to be of much use against a balck dragon). The Wizard, OTOH, simply prepared different, less-commonly-needed spells. The Druid loaded out with also-less-used spells. Their breadth of known spells provided them with an incredible degree of strategic flexibility, which in that case, was more valuable than my sorceror's supreme tactical flexibility.

Personally, I am not a fan of memorizing spells ahead of time. I like to have one specific spell list to cast from. Maybe its just because I can be indecisive, heh.

The advantage non-spontaneous casters have, really,is the ability to decide "my standard spell list SUCKS, it's never useful" ... and change it, entirely. The party wizard, in the same campaign as my sorceror above, changed his spell list regualrly, constantly fine-tuning his array of options to match the evolving conditions of the campaign.

Whereas my sorceror (until his grisly death at 6th level) was stuck "as is", and had to simply HOPE his spells remained useful as time went by.

 

[Crothian]

As for being boring : There's no such thing as a boring class, there are only boring players.

All I ask from a class is that it be strong enough to allow the PC to carry his share of the burden during the adventure. The cure to boredom is roleplaying, not class abilities.

Amen Brother!!!!

 

[AeroDm]

As for being boring : There's no such thing as a boring class, there are only boring players.

I'll second (or third) that.

Sorcs can be 'fixed' in a number of ways, all of which are simple. Some people bump them to d6 to make them more rough and tumble. Some give them more skill/skill points. Some give them feats. Some give them all of these things, which may be too much.

Although this is a little House Ruleish, I think they should just get spontaneous metamagic. Whenever the wizard gets a bonus feat (5/10/15/20) give them +1 metamagic for free. So at 15th level they can auto put on a +3 metamagic once per day no questions asked.

Sorcs are only considered lame because they don't gain _anything_ and there are so many PrCs that grant them tons of powers no questions asked. I think as much of the sorc problem lies in the prestige classes as it does in the sorc.

 

[Knight_Errant]

Anecdote: [snip]
Their breadth of known spells provided them with an incredible degree of strategic flexibility, which in that case, was more valuable than my sorceror's supreme tactical flexibility.

I think this is the key to the debate of spontaneous caster vs. prepared caster. Sorcerers are much more capable of dealing with threats on a tactical level than wizards are. In your example had your party simply headed into the lair of the Black Dragon at the time it was discovered; your sorcerer would have been as prepared as he would have in any other situation where the wizard and druid might not have been. This is not to say that the spells you had available were usefulagainst the Black Dragon but perhaps more so than the wizard who had all of his "information" gathering spells memorized for that day.

The advantage non-spontaneous casters have, really,is the ability to decide "my standard spell list SUCKS, it's never useful" ... and change it, entirely. The party wizard, in the same campaign as my sorceror above, changed his spell list regualrly, constantly fine-tuning his array of options to match the evolving conditions of the campaign.

Exactly.

Whereas my sorceror (until his grisly death at 6th level) was stuck "as is", and had to simply HOPE his spells remained useful as time went by.

And this is one of the weaknesses I see in the Sorcerer class. I have seen many positive suggestions of what could be done to tweak the sorcerer here and elsewhere. I voted that it is underpowered mostly because I dont feel the "fluff" of the class description is translated into the mechanics of the class.

For instance, why do sorcerers need Spellcraft? From the description I would guess that they arent casting spells so much as they are releasing arcane energy. I think WotC lost it when they attempted to apply the arcane spellcasting rules to the sorcerer class; that is to say, the same rules set that wizards use. I think they could have come up with an alternate version of how magic worked for the sorcerer without writing another set of magic rules.

 

[LordAO]

I think the biggest problem with the Sorcerer is in its conception. From the beginning it was deisgned to be a Wizard varient. Look at the Druid, for example. They are divine casters like the Cleric, yet they are a very distinctive class, with their own spell list, unique clas abilities, and flavor. The same goes for the Bard, Paladin, Ranger, etc.

The Sorcerer, on the other hand, has the exact same spell list as the Wizard, the same attack bonus, the same saving throws, a familiar, etc. This despite the fact that Sorcerers are completely different in style, methods, and world view than Wizards. Even the Ranger, Paladin, and Bard get their own spell list, yet Sorcerers do not. I, for one, have trouble seeing a Sorcerer doing things like Leomund's Secret Chest. Every class gets its own unique abilities that are different form any other class - except for the Sorcerer.

Instead of making the Sorcerer something truly unique and cool, what they did give them the same spells a Wizard gets and give them an insane number of spells per day.

 

[Khaalis]

Further Discussion - Fixes

I have begun a continued discussion on possible Fixes to the core class here...

http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?p=1342293#post1342293

Comments welcome and appreciated.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Once sorcerers hit 8th level is when they start to shine in my experience.

Sorcerers are fantastic with metamagic - it is much more their bag of tricks than a wizards, to be honest. How many silent dispels would a wizard prepare? An 8th sorcerer with the feat can unload about 8 if he needs to.

Sorcerers could have more magic items than a wizard, because all their loot can be spent on magic, while a wizard has to spend some loot on spellbooks (the inverse of sorcerer foes have no spellbook as treasure)

I think Sorcerers are a fine class which could benefit from a little extra differentiation. i.e. there is room for more improvement, but they don't have a problem in the game

Except at 2nd level... they have the worst "2nd level" of any class, getting what, a whole new cantrip

 

[dark2112]

I think with one of these small changes the sorcerer would be balanced and a little more fun to play.

That said, I had a great time playing a sorcerer, and would do so again without any changes to the class.

Erm... this doesn't seem to make sense to me. If you'd play it again without changes, then it would seem to be balanced fairly closely with the other casters. If it were too far below them, you'd obviously pick another class instead... Thus, it shouldn't need anything to 'balance' it.

I, of course, had no idea it was there. I'd just gotten to 5th level, and selected Melf's Acid Arrow as my second level 2 spell (my only other of that level was Glitterdust).

Yeah, sorcerers tend to either be combat heavy, or utility heavy. You make a choice, and even then, you lose some of the versatility of having a spell for everything. Scrolls can help make up the lack, however.

... except me. Yep, there I was, with no applicable combat spell.

Sounds like someone needs to pick Energy Substitution. You could have had Melf's Burning Arrow, or Melf's Freezing Arrow, or even Melf's Sonic Arrow, using a full round action instead of the partial. You give up movement, however you gain in versatility what you lose in selected spells. Besides, do you really need a spell to deal damage for each type of damage dealt? Not really. Just pick a good one for a single target, a good one for a group, and Energy Substitution, and you're set. I'd recommend taking the Sonic substitution, as there are few creatures that are resistant to it, and for the odd one that is, you still have the base, un-substituted spell available.

(My usual first picks for spells as a Sorc: Mage Armor, Melf's Acid Arrow, Fireball. Those three spells are my prime as a low level caster, and anything else is just icing on the cake [or a method to deal with pesky recurring npc's])

 

[Li Shenron]

Personally I think Sorcerers are balanced, but the fact that about a third of the people here voted "underpowered" or to throw them away, must mean something.

IMHO the "1-level spell delay" is not nice. Every other class with 9 levels of spells opens up for next spell level at odd class levels, while the Sorcerer is always 1 level late. Next level he only gets to learn 1 single spell of the new level, while Wizards already know 4 (or more from scrolls, it could be even less but it rarely happens). I am absolutely sure that if Sorcerers were planned since the start of 3ed to get next spell level at the same class level of other spellcasters, no one in the whole gaming community would have house-ruled that to make it as it is now, they could have HR-ed everything else but not that! Many thinks that Clerics are still better than the other classes, but no one I heard of yet delayed their spell levels as a HR.

Back to the topic of balance, as I said on the overall I think they are balanced anyway. Whatever "balance" really means of course. Fun to play? At first level they are very good. From level 2 they start to disappoint the player IMXP who sees the other PCs get more and more things to do. Later they shine again because of metamagic total flexibility and because the spells known are not so few anymore. In conclusion, there is some time at mid-low levels when they are somehow frustrating.