Examples of Power Creep?

[Markn]

Campaign Style

Zelda Themelin,

I agree that campaign style makes a big difference and that is in fact how you can keep certain feats or PrC from becoming too powerful. Most of our group uses core stuff only although there are a few players that like to experiment. It is from these players that we see that power creep does exist and for the most part we work around problem things but this thread is directly tied to some people believing that power creep does NOT exist and so I am only trying to point out that it does. In fact, as I have stated in other posts, what disappoints me the most is how sloppy the books are. Poor designs/wording of spells are my biggest pet peeves. The blurring of class spells is another. Why should a warmage be able to heal if an evocation spell allows healing? Why should healing spell be evocation? Why does Murderous Mist give a ref save vs the blindness effect, shouldn't it be fort? It's things like this that just kills consistency that the original designers created with 3.5...

 

[Markn]

Croathian

Croathin,

A ranged sneak attack has a range limit of 30'. This spell states that you take a melee attack against each opponent thus by the rules there is no limit how far away you are from the target as it still a melee attack.

 

[Markn]

Navalar

I think we are going to have to agree to disagree. Point is you believe that certain benefits outweigh other benefits while I believe the opposite. As a warmage, you feel that being behind by 2 levels (as in the case of your example) is worse than always having the proper spell at the ready to punish your opponant and especially so if they have a fire/cold/acid/sonic vulnerability. I feel that if I can convert spells to the creatures weakness this far outstrips the extra dice that a wizard would get and in addition may only have 1 of those spells available to cast (because he chose to memorize something else). Now, if you were to compare it to a sorceror there is even less of an argument.

Anyways, our views are different and I doubt either will see the others points....

 

[Crothian]

Croathin,

A ranged sneak attack has a range limit of 30'. This spell states that you take a melee attack against each opponent thus by the rules there is no limit how far away you are from the target as it still a melee attack.

Doh, actually there is something else that stops this. A spell can only sneak attack the first target.

 

[Markn]

Seesten

Seestan,

I am not sure where you get the idea that these combo's are coming from someone's @ss...Warmage 19/Sorc 1 isn't something rediculous. The Golliath situations don't contain multiclassing at all. Straight fighter and straight barb are all that are needed to illustrate my point. Adding a PrC can further illustrate it (as in the Frenzied Beserker example).

Most of my issues are with spells and just for the record whenever I have mentioned CA below I am speaking about Complete Arcane, not Complete Adventurer. In fact most of my issue are with spells and most people who have replied have ignored the spell examples and have not given any counter information or have read the spell wrong (as in the Whirling Blade being a ranged attack and thus would only work up to 30' away when in fact it is a melee attack).

Navar,

Your reply that a straight fighter or sorceror is more powerful than a mulitclassing wizard/rogue is not an apple to apple comparison. Players play straight classes and others play multiclassed characters. They exist. People play them. My point is that whatever the core books can do, the splatbooks can almost always do it better. Particularly in spellcasting.

 

[Markn]

Crothian

Can you show me where it states that a spell can only sneak attack the first target?

 

[Navar]

In fact most of my issue are with spells and most people who have replied have ignored the spell examples and have not given any counter information or have read the spell wrong (as in the Whirling Blade being a ranged attack and thus would only work up to 30' away when in fact it is a melee attack).

but what do you say to this:
So at best you can get is a level 4 wizard. So you are loosing 2d6 of sneak attack damage by taking the levels you need to cast the spell. So at level 5 you can attack 6 foes (if they all happen to be lined up) and do 3d6 to them. (the best slashing weapon a medium rogue is profescient with does 1d6 damage) At level 6 the damage is the same. With your +2 BaB you have to roll to attack them all. How is this broken. At highter levels (when a straight wizard would have better spells) it gets even less effective.

And my question was Does there exist a class that overshadows ALL classes. I could just argue that the warlorck is more powerful than the monk, but that wouldn't prove power creep if the wizard is more powerful than them both. Heck I could argue that the scout is more powerful than someone who multiclasses 1 level of every class, but that would also not be a good argument (esp. if the scout is less powerful than any of the core classes by itself)

 

[FireLance]

Can you show me where it states that a spell can only sneak attack the first target?

Complete Arcane, p. 86. The section discusses the interaction of sneak attacks with weaponlike spells, in particular, spells that grant multiple hits.

Some weaponlike spells can strike multiple times in the same round. When the caster gets a bonus on damage with such spells (including sneak attack damage), the extra damage applies only to the first attack, whether that attack hits or not.

It is arguable whether whirling blade is actually a weaponlike spell, but the intent of the rule seems clear. The sneak attack damage would only affect the first target.

 

[Navar]

And on ice knife (now that I look it up) only assassins, war mages, and Wu Jen can take it. So it really doesn't make any of the core classes any more powerful. You would have to prove that the warmage is ALREADY more powerful than the wizard (and you say you have (by taking 1 level in wizard) but I disagree so reguardless) this spell doesn't really apply.

 

[Storyteller01]

It seems people are pulling combos from out their *** and adding in an anecdotal, if you use feat x(which requires 9 feats) with ability y(that requires you be a level 17 wizard, who gets only like 6 feats in its whole career that arent metamagic/item create) which doesnt hold water even at a casual glance. What are you DM's doing? Honestly. If Jack says to me, "He, I want to go 5 levels of Thief, 3 levels of barbarian, 10 levels of Frenzied Berserker and then 2 levels of mage for true strike and wraithstrike, not just me, but the whole gaming group would LAUGH HIM OUT THE DOOR. Not just is it stupid to the point of silly, its an insult to the DM's intelligence to ask. Lots of the feats and class abilities arent designed to work together because they are on polar opposite character types, and they shouldnt be on the same character at all.

True, but that doen't stop people from trying. I had someone who played 3.5 almost exclusively come into my campaign later than the others. The rule was that you could start a character at a level one less than the group average.

His response (using the Savage Species. It's not 3.0, but it hasn't been replaced with a 3.5 version yet...): "I'll take one level as a yaunti brood guard, go through [some ritual] to become an anthromorphic cat, then I'll go through [ritual] to become a Beast of Legend. I'll take the psionic template and [3 other templates I can't remember]. It's all here in the book. Nothing says I can't do it." He was right. There was nothing in the book that disallowed it. I did not allow it (which caused the loss of a player), but I don't think WotC is figuring these situations in when they develope a product.

Agreed, it's up to the DM to maintain their campaign, but WotC isn't helping matters. Even if they're not deliberately creating the power creep, their not doing much to stop it either...