Core Classes: More magic or more abilities?

[Olgar Shiverstone]

That'd be good. Leave spellcasting to the full casters and gish, not your mother-in-law, your grandma, and your dog.

I fail to understand the obsession with githyanki fighter/magic-users.

 

[Varianor Abroad]

Paladin and ranger spellcasting would suck only half as much if their caster levels were equal to their class levels.

I do that in my games now. Truth of the matter is that if they had spells (realistically abilities as someone said upthread) that other classes didn't get, they would be much better off than they are now.

 

[SSquirrel]

I don't know about eliminating the Paladin's spellcasting abilities. His powers are divinely bestowed, so it makes sense for him to also have some spellcasting ability (And some of the Paladin's spells are useful. Not all, but some. Especially the ones in later supplements).

The Ranger, however, probably would be better off without spells. But I'd like the option. What I'd like is for Ranger spellcasting ability to become just one of several Talent Trees available to the Ranger. That'd be nice, IMO.

As for the number of non-spellcasting classes versus spellcasting class, there's no need to remove spellcasting abilities from existing classes to balance that out. Just add non-spellcasting classes (Like the Marshal, for instance).

That's a big part of the problem. Ranger and Paladin spells suck, esp in the core. The core version of both classes hamstrung their spellcasting greatly and made the classes less desirable. Why play a broken Paladin when you could rock everyone as a Cleric and still have a very similar background? There were lots of people who had spells w/no business having them *Assassin anyone?* I think the reason rangers have them, besides the sacred cow angle, is following the logic of "well, rangers would most likely just multi into druid to gain spells, so let's buff the class a bit and give them spells that are druid-like." Most of my friends ignored the Paladin and just grabbed 1 or 2 levels of the front loaded Ranger and went about their business.

The classes in the core have to be good and desirable in groups IN THE CORE! If they aren't, no amount of dressing them up in future supplements will work. Esp w/DMs who disallow any non-core heh

 

[JoeGKushner]

While I personally would prefer less magic use in classes, D&D has always had 50% or more of its core classes as spellcasters.

oD&D had two of the three classes able to cast spells.

bD&D has 50% of the classes able to cast spells.

1st and 2nd edition AD&D both had a majority of its classes capable of casting spells. Historically, only the fighter and thief tend to be spell-less.

I don't see how 3rd edition "drifted so far from its core roots."

For me, it was ability score requierements., Paladins and Rangers were very hard to enter into. 3e ellminated that.