Developer's Roundtable: Mystic Theurge

[Zaruthustran]

Why stop with clr/wiz?

I wonder if they'll make a "prestige" class for other favorite class combos, like Barbarian/Rogue or Ranger/Rogue?

WotC designer A: I want to make a fast, powerful melee character who also does sneak attack damage. I thought of doing Barbarian/Rogue, but then I have to choose between multiple rages per day and huge sneak attack damage.

WotC designer B: You have to chose? Like, as in chose a role or "class"? Feh. Why not make a "prestige" class that simply gives you all the abilities you want? How about 'Angry Thief', that gives you multiple rages but doesn't reduce your sneak attack progession? Make the requirements really simple, like "ability to rage" and "2d6 sneak attack".

WotC designer A: Score! Now let's figure out a way for the class to heal itself--no one likes the Cleric class.

-z

I put "prestige" in quotes because like Monte said, the Mystic Theurge class is just a mechanical beast. As Jonathen said, it's as flavorless as a multiclassed wiz/clr. Where's the prestige in that?

 

[Outlaw]

y should the player of the Clr/Wiz be spanked around, but not the player of the Ftr/Rog? Compare the two and I'm sure you'll see that the Ftr/Rog will come out on top every time.

Certain classes are mutually conducive to one another. Although a fighter/rogue certainly out performs a cleric/wizard on the power meter (assuming that power is measured by effectiveness in combat, which seems to be all that's left of role playing), that class isn't as effective as a single classed fighter (who kicks a lot more ass in combat) or a single classed rogue (who can use his vast amount of skills to be effective in combat with his sneak attack as well as getting by nasty traps and such).

The fighter/bard is only good at enhancing his fighting ability, but again the straight classed fighter would still prove more effective and you sacrifice armor and BAB just to get yourself some buffing spells. If you're trying to be a bard who fights, you'll never be as good as a straight classed version of either you, but merely be able to hit a little more often in combat (and really, weapon finesse and cat's grace can accomplish the same thing).

So why is it that a cleric/wizard has to measure up? The balance should be between multi-class and straight class, not making sure that every possible conceiveable multi-class option is as effective as everything else. Because that just can't happen and the Mystic Theurge is a horrible way to try and remedy that fact.

Perhaps the wizard/cleric can actually utilize his different classes to be a support character rather than an ass kicker. And maybe, he can use the affiliations those classes give him (churches and guilds) to assist the party when it's not killing things.

 

[Mercule]

Honestly, I don't think a single caster class is the way to go. Just as Fighter, Paladin, Ranger, and Barbarian all have a place as a warrior class, so do Wizard, Sorcerer, Cleric, and Druid as casters.

The reason the warrior aspect of multiclassing works well is because BAB isn't on a separate table for each class -- it stacks. Spellcasting is more like saying that a Monk/Fighter multiclass can only use the BAB he earned as a Monk for unarmed attacks and can only use BAB earned as a Fighter for swordplay. If things worked that way, there would be (appropriate) cries of "broken".

So, to fix the spell progression, we need a mechanic for caster level. I have a couple of ideas, although they are from the top of my head and I make no claim to them being a suitable final solution, they should make my point. I'll give my best idea, half-baked though it may be.

Each character literally has a "Caster Level" (CL) value similar to the BAB. Wizards, Clerics, Druids, and Sorcerers all get a +1/1 progression (like a Fighter's BAB); Bards get a +3/4 progression; and Paladins and Rangers get a +1/2 progression. The CL from these classes stacks, just like BAB does.

This CL is referrenced against a chart that looks suspiciously like the Wizard's "Spells/day". This gives the _total_ spells slots the character has available to them.

The hard part is how to populate the slots -- and this is where the half-baked part comes in. Can a Wiz1/Clr19 add Wish to his spell book? Can a Clr1/Wiz19 spontaneously swap Magic Missle for a Cure Light? -- What about Dispel Magic for a Cure Serious? How does the Sorcerer's artillery barage work?

I think the Sorcerer is the easiest. For every Sorcerer level taken, the character gets a few "spell-like abilities" of her choosing (with some level restrictions). These really are spell-like abilities except that there are still spell levels attached to the spells and they have an odd means of determining "x/day". Every day, when the Sorcerer prepares her spells (for all classes), she sets aside a number of slots into a common pool for her abilities. The return on investment for these slots is 2:1, thus the increased castings the sorcerer enjoys.

I see four possibilities for determining Wizards.
-1) Base it on just Wizard level: every two class levels gives access to another spell level. The Wiz1/Clr19 can only cast lvl 1 Wizard Spells and a Wiz5/Clr15 can cast 3rd level Wizard spells.
-2) Base it on just Wizard level: every class level grants access to another spell level. A Wiz1/Clr19 only has 1st level Arcane Spells, but a Wiz5/Clr15 has 5th level spells. This provides a bit more flexibility for casting but, since the slots aren't immediately available to cast the higher level spells doesn't effect a single-classed character at all.
-3) Add an exclusive skill for arcane spells, or for each school of spell. Base max level of spell available on the Total of the skill. 2nd level spells require a 7 (6 ranks +1 from an Intelligence 12). 5th level requires a 15 (12 ranks +2 from intelligence +1 from an assumed magic item).
-4) Similar to 3), add "points" in the class that can be applied to knowledge of the schools. This should be balanced to provide balanced access to a pure wizard, and work out well for customizing specialists, too. It would also allow a Cleric to only dip into Illusion spells and do it well. For balance, the different schools would probably have varying costs, much like they do for specialization. This one probably has the most promise for balanced play, but could prove troublesome.

Clerics.... Options 1) and 2) from Wizard would work fairly well. Another route to go would be to limit breadth rather than depth. Make the most use of the Domains mechanic. Throw every Cleric spell into a domain and give Deities favored and standard domains. The Favored Domains would work like current domains, while the Standard Domains just allowed spell selection. Give the Cleric a handful of domains (Favored and Standard) at 1st level. Award more as they progress in Cleric.

Of course, you could just turn Clerics into divine Sorcerers, which actually makes more sense to be, anyway.

I'm rather stumped on Druids. My instinct is to use the Sorcerer mechanic rather than preparation.

Paladins and Rangers would reflect Clerics and Druids, respectively. Bards would reflect Sorcerers.

 

[rounser]

Starting as a Wiz 3/Clr 3, this would give a Wiz 3/Clr 3/MTh 10 the spellcasting of a Wiz 11/Clr 10 or Wiz 10/Clr 11. Does that seem more balanced?

More importantly it seems a bit pointless - you could simply be a Wiz 10/Clr 10 instead. Hardly justification for a bandaid class.

 

[Saeviomagy]

More importantly it seems a bit pointless - you could simply be a Wiz 10/Clr 10 instead. Hardly justification for a bandaid class.

Read it again. He's only 16th level. He'd be a wiz8/clr8. I agree that it's not nearly enough - you only gain one level of spells over a normal multiclass.

 

[Grazzt]

BTW, was I the only one greatly disturbed by a "Magic" reference in terms of "here's why D&D is balanced?" (Don't get me wrong, I think Magic is a nice card game, but I'm not sure we want to try to impose "Magic" on D&D or vice versa).

--The Sigil

Nope- I too shuddered when I saw that reference (Mr. Tweet I believe is the one that made it).

 

[Hypersmurf]

If you want a Maori Lion Hunter...

Heh. While this is an odd idea - New Zealand's native mammals include several species of bats, and the Polynesians brought rats and dogs with them... not a lot of lion-hunting in these parts - interestingly enough, we had someone mauled by a tiger a few weeks ago

-Hyp.

 

[MerricB]

Nope, you already have Magic in D&D. You've had it since 2nd Edition. Possibly before, but first noticable in 2nd Edition.

Why? Because the game is expandable, and the tools are such things as "kits", "feats", "prestige classes", "magic items" and "spells".

It's the way those things interact that make the game like Magic - there are so many of them, they're not predictable.

2nd edition demonstrated the "Decipher 1E Star Trek CCG" method of balance... the basic game did not allow much balancing later on, and everything added to it was not considered as part of the whole. By the time people tried to rebalance it, broken combinations of kits, spells, items and suchlike abounded.

3rd Edition, especially with the OGL, allows expansion on an even greater scale than 2nd edition, however the basic game has been rebalanced with that in mind. Feats and Prestige Classes make the game very hard to balance overall... two Prestige Classes can interact in surprising ways. Cosmic Encounter Cubed!

The Magic designers learnt, through trial and error, that a card that looked fine in one environment would fail utterly in another. It is their greatest challenge to make sure cards don't distort the game utterly, whilst remaining entertaining. They use a few tricks like limiting the environment (through tournament types), but in general the principles they use are fairly sound. (Decipher have learnt this as well, by the way - their later games are much more solid than their first).

d20 and 3.5E designers are at that point where they're not quite sure what all the rules are for balanced design. The Mystic Theurge reinforces that! Compared to a Magic game, D&D takes a huge amount of time to playtest; and results vary even more wildly than Magic.

Magic is a game based on different components interacting with each other. 3E is also of this type, and the lessons learnt in one frame may be taken into the other.

I would far rather have 3.5E and other d20 System products designed with lessons learnt in Magic kept in mind, rather than the hard-won principles discovered there completely ignored.

Is the Mystic Theurge broken? I don't know. But even if it is... it can be fixed, and WotC have learnt that lesson.

Cheers!

 

[William Ronald]

MerricB,

A good point. I am not entirely decided on the Mystic Theurge, but I think that D&D 3.0 and 3.5 show a learning curve by the developers. It seems to me that the system is good, but could be improved. (Hence, the desire for a revision.)

It is now easier to get more feedback from players to discover what works and what doesn't work for different people. (For example, I recall that 3.0 was designed for an average campaign life of 2 years. If you want to have a campaign last longer, the slow advancement rules might be a good option.)

I do think the Mystic Theurge has a few drawbacks, including the loss of upper level spells when compared with other spellcasters of equal level, and DC problems.

The suggestions of altering how classes and multi-classing works sounds as if it would be beyond the scope of a mere revision. It almost calls for another edition, which would likely not be meet with cheers.

Obviously, the designers are still learning about how the system works in practice. So, I consider the discussions on the mystic theurge useful.

I can see a role for it, as it reminds me of the kabalistic tradition of magic. It would also work well for devotees of deities of magic.

So, have the big names (Monte Cook, Jonathan Tweet, Sean K. Reynolds, and Andy Collins) have anything more to say on the issues.

Overall, I have seen a lot of good discussion on the thread. Keep up the good debate.

 

[JohnClark]

I just wanted to jump in and note how excellent this discussion has been. It's great to see all the ENworlders and the game designers get together for a really good discussion about the pros and cons of this issue. Keep it up!