Examples of Power Creep?

[Crothian]

Do you really need evidence of druid power creep? Natural spell? Legendary Ape? Giant Squid form? Things that put fighters to shame? Fire seeds? Things that put wizards to shame?

Okay, the question was actually how do we know the druid is the pet of a designer?

Giant squid form? That many water based adventures that that is useful? Natural spell actually we have not had any problem with our druids having. Wildshape is too versatile, but again no big problems for use in game.

 

[Crothian]

Not that it matters, clearly WoTC don't playtest their materials in any event.

Actually its not that clear (unless you know people at Wizards and they have told you this). THe only evidence that supports that is the lack of playtesters in the credits of some books, but I don't know if that actually means the material was not playtested.

 

[hero4hire]

Just for me can you cite where you get these feats?

Sure.

Leap Attack is in the Complete Adventurer

Powerful Charge and Greater Powerful Charge are in both Eberron and the Miniature's Handbook

Flying Kick is in the Complete Fighter

The Psionic Feats are in, of course, the Psionic Book

Also I believe there are Charging Feats I didnt mention, in Forgotten Realms Player's Guide, Races of Faerun, and a recent Gragon magazine.

 

[FireLance]

No, you only need to take 1 level of wiz and precocious apprentice (wraithstrike) feat from complete arcane. Plain old core rules pearls of power are all you need to cast this spell as many times as you want.
No effectiveness lost. Effectiveness shoots through the roof actually.

Even one level of wizard loses you a point of BAB. You might not lose out 1d6 of sneak attack, but your sneak attack progression is delayed a level. Pearls of power for second-level spells cost 4,000 gp each, so a high-level character can have quite a few, but "as many times as you want" is a bit of an exaggeration. Plus, they are command-word activated, so you need to spend a standard action recovering your spell and maybe a move action to retrieve another pearl from where you're storing them. Much easier to Use Magic Device a scroll or wand of wraithstrike as I suggested, and even then, a rogue using core-only spells and equipment is not too far behind, if only because a scroll or wand using rogue has to spend actions switching equipment (even with Quick Draw, sheathing a weapon or putting away a wand is a move action) and can't use this tactic every round.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Just because you're not the designer doesn't mean you can't test the system. In fact the worst person to test the mechanic is the designer. Not that it matters, clearly WoTC don't playtest their materials in any event.

-the rest snipped to avoid ENWorld rulebreaking-

Just because you're not on the design team does, however, mean that you probably haven't had the chance to give a class that was just released in January 2005.

Have you played, GMed or even been in a group with a scout from level 1 to 20 against default assumption (wealth by level, appropriate EL range, four person party) opposition in Greyhawk?

If not, what qualifies you to comment on it?

WotC employees are just as capable of glancing at a class and making an uniformed snap judgement as anyone else. What makes yours more valid?

As for druids being a "pet class," WotC has admitted to making the druid and cleric more powerful in an attempt to attract players to the "healer classes," which have traditionally been considered a necessary evil in many groups. I think that's an unfortunate design decision, but it is a conscious decision, and it's also almost entirely limited to core.

 

[DungeonMaster]

As an aside but representative of edition creep if you will...

Okay, the question was actually how do we know the druid is the pet of a designer?

Oh now this much is VERY clear.
There were NIL complaints about the druid being "weak" leading up to 3.5.
In 3.5 core vs. core 3rd edition they got:

Relaxed druidic oaths
Summoning spell slot burn + an improved Summoning feat
Natural spell
Spot and listen as class skills (need a ranger anymore... no)
Free animal empathy (effectively)
Wild armor
Cheap dragonhide full platemail, monk's belt that allows silly levels of AC.
No more beast or dire or size restrictions so dinosaurs are legit wildshapes as are dire weasels at level 5.
Polymorph changed to include creature type so Wildshape changed too and thus you get things like plant tyep which gives you: immunity to critical hits, sneak attack, paralysis, stunning, mind affecting spells (including 3.5 power-words oddly enough). You can also cast spells like animal growth on yourself.
Ex abilities from 3.5 wildshape like blood drain from a dire weasel that's un-resistable Con damage and so forth.
Poached wizard spells like "polymorph other, jump, gust of wind, spider climb, move earth, stoneskin, wind wall" - at the same level as the wizard no less! Anything remotely associated with an animal or elements in the name or even in the bloody component they gave to druids. Why jump? Grasshopper leg. Yeah that makes sense...
All their spells went down in level (to arcane levels again in some cases), like "ice storm, earthquake, sleet storm, produce flame, speak with animals, quench. Most arcane spells went up in level.

Anyhow, I agree with beaver1024. It's very much a pet class.
My own personal theory is Kestrel likes druids and Andy did it for her. Just a theory. I'de never play a wizard or a ranger in 3.5 however as a result.

 

[Crothian]

Oh now this much is VERY clear.
There were NIL complaints about the druid being "weak" leading up to 3.5.

There were nil complaints? Not a single person of the million D&D gamers ever complained about the Druid? Well, I know personally that that is false because I was on the boards back then and I remember the complaints. I even made some of them.

I'm not saying the Druid never got a boost, and I have no idea why two seperate posters seem to think that.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

As an aside but representative of edition creep if you will...

Oh now this much is VERY clear.
There were NIL complaints about the druid being "weak" leading up to 3.5.
In 3.5 core vs. core 3rd edition they got:

-litany of 3.0 to 3.5 druid buffs-

Anyhow, I agree with beaver1024. It's very much a pet class.
My own personal theory is Kestrel likes druids and Andy did it for her. Just a theory. I'de never play a wizard or a ranger in 3.5 however as a result.

I wouldn't call the druid's improvement representative of edition creep - edition creep happens (at least basic to 1e and 2e to 3e), but frankly the massive powerup of dragons between 2e and 3e doesn't compare to the unprecedented boost to druids. They went from being average to being clearly the best of the best, and by a fair margin.

However, I'm not going to call them a "pet class," implying that the designers buff classes they like at the expense of those they don't.

If I recall, someone at Wizards mentioned druids as being the least-played of any core class. Their buffs in 3.5 were meant to make them more attractive. A well-read power gamer knows what to pick up when the GM brings down the CORE ONLY hammer, but I doubt the changes addressed the fact that a lot of players just don't like the druid, flavor-wise.

 

[Markn]

Merric

It isn't necessary for the warmage to take the wizard level early on. Just that it can be done. Honestly, IMO fireball isn't an end all be all spell. Remember, if you are able to cast 5 of the same spells from your reprotoire (sp?) that are extremely effective against whatever you are fighting, are you going to miss fireball? Not at all. The lowly wizard may have it but he can cast it once maybe twice a day and if so he has no other 3rd level spells. It's even worse for him if he memorized it and you are fighting fire creatures. Now that spell is useless. The warmage says, no biggie, I'll change to a spell that IS effective. Once he has one that works he uses it over and over and over and over and over till its dead. That is an effective use of spells. What good is the wizard if he memorizes the wrong spells for the day. His power is reduced drastically. Being always ready as the warmage is, is extremely potent. It's not always about the numbers and the max damage you can do...anyone with tactics will tell you that.

In addition to that, once both classes have evolved to mid levels the power difference in getting spells first is less and less important and is countered by the sheer number and availability of spells.

Just curious...Have you seen a warmage in play?

As for spells like sleep that could be extremely effective or useless based on a save...IMO they are risky. Sometimes there's a reward for that type of spell. Sometimes there's death.

 

[FireLance]

Comments on the Scout, Warmage, Hexblade, Spellthief and Favored Soul from actual play experience (1st and 2nd level):

My group statted out a 28-point buy Human character of each of the above classes and played them through a couple of adventures and found that they were not very much more powerful than other classes of the same level.

The scout's class abilities and light armor pretty much forced it into the skirmisher role. It was fun to watch him move around the battlefield, avoiding getting close to enemies and trying to set up flanks for other characters. Damage-wise, he was decent but not overwhelming. We gave him a longspear for reach, so he did 1d8+1d6 base with skirmish. Note that a fighter with a greatsword and 2-for-1 power attack would essentially do 2d6+2 at the same level of accuracy. The scout's biggest weakness was when enemies got close up to him and denied him the ability to skirmish without attracting an AOO.

The hexblade couldn't tank as well as a fighter because he was restricted to light armor only. Still, he did decent damage, and his hexblade's curse saved the warmage from being grappled by an ogre (more on that later). Apart from that one moment of glory, he basically got hit, took damage, and was healed by the favored soul. Overall, not a terribly exciting class to play.

The favored soul was pretty much relegated to being the healer - the curse of all divine spellcasters. His one moment of glory was when he disarmed an ogre with a well-placed command. The ogre proved to much less dangerous without its greatclub, which the warmage grabbed and ran off with after narrowly escaping a grapple attempt (the hexblade's curse helped).

The warmage was fun to play, from a blow things up perspective. Still, the narrow focus of his spells really hit home on a few occasions. There were occasions when sleep or ray of enfeeblement would have been more useful than another magic missile or lesser orb of acid, e.g. when fighting a number of orcs and gnolls, or when faced with a single powerful creature such as an ogre.

The spellthief never got to use most of his abilities, as we faced no traps and only one spellcaster. The highlight of his career was "borrowing" a healing spell from the favored soul to cast on the hexblade so that the favored soul could concentrate on holding off some orcs and gnolls.

Overall assessment: the new classes are fun to play, but didn't do much more than a fighter, a wizard, a cleric and a rogue could have done. If there's been any power creep, I haven't noticed it yet.