Classes need to be ready to go from the beginning

[MerricB]

I've just come away from playing an extremely unfun session of Iron Heroes, and I've been thinking about the reasons that I found so it such a bad experience.

We've played 4 sessions of IH in this current minicampaign, starting from level 1, and here's my biggest problem with it: I was playing a Hunter, and the character was weaker than every other character.

I wasn't the best archer (I wasn't even close), I had the worst hit points, the worst AC, and the other PCs were pretty much better in melee than me.

My special abilities? I could ignore 1 point of cover AC/round - and give my friends the same bonus. Oh, and get this... I could spend an entire round making a DC 10 Intelligence check to gain a token that I could spend later in the combat to give a couple of combatants +4 to flanking instead of +2. That is, if I made the check. I had a 16 Int, so 30% of the time I'd just stand there doing absolutely nothing in the round.

Call that fun? Because I don't.

The other players were gaining tokens to help them be more effective in combat. Them, not the rest of the party.

A player needs to be able to do something that distinguishes them from their friends. In AD&D, the 1st-level magic-user was fairly useless most of the time, but they could cast sleep, which was far and away a "bomb" spell. 4-16 kobolds asleep? Cool! The thief could backstab. The cleric, if a just a little weaker than the fighter in melee, could turn undead if they came up.

Now, I'm leaving out the cleric's spells, because casting bless or cure light wounds isn't fun. It's occasionally effective, but giving a bonus to all your friends isn't as fun as, say, casting righteous might on yourself. Personal spells say, "I can do something better now, watch me roar!"

Consider if bless was "each ally gets +1 to hit, you get +2 to hit", would that make it a more fun spell? I think it would.

Browsing around, I see that the hunter would get a lot better at 4th or 5th level. I consider that bad design. A class doesn't have to be at its best from the beginning, but it *does* need something to make the poor levels palatable. The AD&D magic-user got sleep. That allowed them to pass the bad levels until level 5 came along, and they really got interesting.

So, if any of the 4e designers are reading this, please make each class have something compelling it can do from 1st level.

And, please, for the leader classes, make their global effects help them just a little bit more than the others!

Cheers!

 

[Merlion]

I would add to that that for some people, supporting allies IS as fun as doing it yourself. However I firmly believe that design wise, no class should be stuck solely in that supporting role to the sacrifice of having even the option of being capable themselves.

 

[Cadfan]

Speaking as someone who constantly plays a cleric, and who's favorite prc is the combat medic, yes, there are people who enjoy supporting others.

The trick is to make supporting others dynamic. Make it action packed.

This lack of dynamism is what makes the bard so lame. The bard sits there and declares, "Ok, I cast haste." Then he says, "Ok, everyone gets my song bonus." He doesn't DO anything. For those rounds, you could honestly just let his player go out for the nightly pizza, and operate his character for him. You all know what he's going to do, and it doesn't require any meaningful thought on his part. He could just make notecards and lay them on the table in order, and go call his girlfriend or something.

What made the combat medic a fun class for me to play is that I was continually running from place to place, doling out healing to those I felt needed the most support, combining the healing with extra effects that I chose, and balancing all of that against my ability to lay down long term damage with Spiritual Weapon (a shockingly good spell if you cast it early). The tactical decisions of our party basically lay in my hands. Not only could I decide which enemies we should focus upon (by boosting the allies fighting those particular enemies), but I decided overall tactics. You can bet that if I told the rogue to move and attack a particular target, she did. Otherwise she was out of range of my 40' move next round, and who knows if she'd be around the round after that.

See, THAT was fun. Even though the only attack rolls I ever made were with Spiritual Weapon.

Support can be fun. It just has to be ACTIVE support. Passive support is about the lamest thing ever.

 

[WarlockLord]

I'd consider that more leadership. That looks like it could be fun.

My face-to-face group never has any clerics, unless we can sucker someone into it This is because we start at low levels, so everyone goes for somebody who can dish out some damage, rather than the low level cleric, who, at low levels, can't do anything. They're outfought by the fighter, outspelled by the wizard (who usually ends up plinking away with his crossbow), and generally are regarded as walking band-aids.

So happy the wizard is getting at-will and per encounter attacks. Crossbows suck!

 

[Jason Kain]

I have to agree with CADfan on this one. Active support can be fun. However, I think he misses a bit of the split. Supporting a party isn't just active and passive. There's another divide: Singular or Co-operative.

I think the main problem with the idea of 'support' classes is that most of the ideas of support are singular. Cast ____ on someone else, so they get better. That's where the problem comes in, because most of the time it's a no-effort, no-interaction solution to the problem. I hate to do this here, but you can look at World of Warcraft. Every successful group needs some type of healer/buffer. When they're in a battle, healing, there's usually no thanks, no excitement, no nothing. It ceases being an RPG and becomes whack-a-mole with whoever needs help. Meanwhile, the rest of the party is doing something to influence the battle. I know, healing does influence the battle, but for the most part, it's just making sure someone else can influence it longer.

A lot of the problem is most singular support characters don't have a chance to shine unless the group is in deep trouble. When everyone is low on health, a character is at -9 and falling, and the cleric pulls max numbers on his heal, getting the character back on his feet, that's exciting. When the big buff spell is the only thing that lets the fighter hit the monster, that's kind of cool. However, this dynamic is also the problem of singular support. In order for it to shine, someone else has to stop shining. In order for most singular support to be fun, the potential of another player(the dying character, the fighter that can't hit unless buffed) not having fun has to be introduced.

The main trick with co-operative support is that while others are benefiting from his actions, the actions aren't spent specifically to have you allies benefit. Casting bless is an action spent just to benefit someone, healing someone when you attack an enemy is an action spent that benefits someone. It's a subtle difference in text, but it's there.

I've played a psion in one campaign. I was having fun, as I spent my actions on whatever I felt like, and the party benefited from it. The least fun moments came near the end, when I was dealing damage for the sake of dealing damage. Everyone else was doing my job just as well as I could, a lot of the times better. After that character died, I built a cleric. Full healing/buffing based, but focusing on the mass spells. Every time I made someone else better at their job, I was getting better at my own. It worked, because I wasn't just helping other people have fun, I was making it easier to have fun myself.

 

[Glyfair]

I think the main problem with the idea of 'support' classes is that most of the ideas of support are singular. Cast ____ on someone else, so they get better. That's where the problem comes in, because most of the time it's a no-effort, no-interaction solution to the problem.

Indeed, that seems to be one of the things that are addressed in 4E. Several of the playtest examples show the "leader" classes supporting their party while being active in the fight.

 

[Frostmarrow]

My special abilities? I could ignore 1 point of cover AC/round - and give my friends the same bonus.

Fractioned abilities like this need to go. As well as stonecunning or other rarely used tricks. Why waste space on stuff that obviously comes from someone else's game?

 

[Jack99]

I've just come away from playing an extremely unfun session of Iron Heroes, and I've been thinking about the reasons that I found so it such a bad experience.

We've played 4 sessions of IH in this current minicampaign, starting from level 1, and here's my biggest problem with it: I was playing a Hunter, and the character was weaker than every other character.

I wasn't the best archer (I wasn't even close), I had the worst hit points, the worst AC, and the other PCs were pretty much better in melee than me.

My special abilities? I could ignore 1 point of cover AC/round - and give my friends the same bonus. Oh, and get this... I could spend an entire round making a DC 10 Intelligence check to gain a token that I could spend later in the combat to give a couple of combatants +4 to flanking instead of +2. That is, if I made the check. I had a 16 Int, so 30% of the time I'd just stand there doing absolutely nothing in the round.

Call that fun? Because I don't.

The other players were gaining tokens to help them be more effective in combat. Them, not the rest of the party.

A player needs to be able to do something that distinguishes them from their friends. In AD&D, the 1st-level magic-user was fairly useless most of the time, but they could cast sleep, which was far and away a "bomb" spell. 4-16 kobolds asleep? Cool! The thief could backstab. The cleric, if a just a little weaker than the fighter in melee, could turn undead if they came up.

Now, I'm leaving out the cleric's spells, because casting bless or cure light wounds isn't fun. It's occasionally effective, but giving a bonus to all your friends isn't as fun as, say, casting righteous might on yourself. Personal spells say, "I can do something better now, watch me roar!"

Consider if bless was "each ally gets +1 to hit, you get +2 to hit", would that make it a more fun spell? I think it would.

Browsing around, I see that the hunter would get a lot better at 4th or 5th level. I consider that bad design. A class doesn't have to be at its best from the beginning, but it *does* need something to make the poor levels palatable. The AD&D magic-user got sleep. That allowed them to pass the bad levels until level 5 came along, and they really got interesting.

So, if any of the 4e designers are reading this, please make each class have something compelling it can do from 1st level.

And, please, for the leader classes, make their global effects help them just a little bit more than the others!

Cheers!

Maybe you should play First Person Shooters instead of DnD. It seems you have an absolute distaste for the cooperative part of it.

Cheers.

 

[shilsen]

Maybe you should play First Person Shooters instead of DnD. It seems you have an absolute distaste for the cooperative part of it.

Cheers.

Only 7 posts after the OP to say "you don't know how to play the game right"? Not bad at all. Remarkably unhelpful and not contributing to the conversation at all, but not bad.

I would add to that that for some people, supporting allies IS as fun as doing it yourself. However I firmly believe that design wise, no class should be stuck solely in that supporting role to the sacrifice of having even the option of being capable themselves.

I think that's an excellent point. I am currently playing some PCs whose job in combat is purely to make the others shine, some whose job is to be among the primary damage-dealers or those most negatively affecting the enemy, and some who are a combination thereof. The option for any class to do all of those things is important, IMO.

 

[Gold Roger]

And, please, for the leader classes, make their global effects help them just a little bit more than the others!

I think they are already adressing this by making "party buffs" not taking actions. Making them also improve the leader more than everyone else would propably be overkill.

Instead, imo, leaders should also gain some abilities that do something else than buffing, healing and helping others. And I'm sure they will.