Fighters didn't matter after 11th level?

[Thasmodious]

1) They still do. A flying wizard is plenty easy to hit, by a challenging foe. That and dimension door just put the wizard on the run, they gain him time. Stoneskin is cool (unless the enemies have adamantine) but it isn't a certain thing against high level opponents that can dish out lots of damage, and you waste your round casting it, so the enemy is already in front of you next round if the fighter isn't there. Summoning a dire bear is a round casting time, so the DC is damage + spell level + 10. At that high level, anything that causes a concentration check can easily do enough damage to make the check near impossible.

2) You can still get hit casting defensively, you just don't provoke an attack of opportunity. Any spell that is a round or more is going to have a difficult concentration check (Damage+10+ spell level). Plus you need to make the initial concentration check for the defensive casting (which is pretty easy).

Wizards are my favorite class (well, tied with fighters, 3e was mixed emotions for me, wizards rocked, fighters sucked). I know them quite well and have played wizards extensively throughout the 3e years. A party and a wizard certainly don't need a fighter. It's nice to have a hit point soak in between you and the foes you are about to obliterate, but it is absolutely not necessary. You don't need to cast fly, you have a cloak of flying. Or boots of levitation at middle levels. Ranged attacks aren't a huge threat as they are generally much weaker than what brutish, bashing monsters can do. Dimension door has a range of a few hundred feet. So do many of my spells. You don't DD where you are still in range of a charge from the frost giant. An animal summons lasts for more than one round as well, so if you really need a pool of points to stand in front of a monster, its well worth it. And you cast it first, not after the monster is eating you. You do have party members, hopefully they like to keep you in the back and clear to do your thing. Protection spells are a backup. Metamagic is your friend. Your job is to not stand in front of beasties and you have tons of tools with which to do just that. Your battlefield control can make safe spots for you. Shut things off with a wall of force then levitate above it, surround enemies with a wall of fire, cloak yourself in fog, throw up some webs, etc.

Even when you have to make a concentration check, its not difficult at high levels. You have plenty of skill points and not much to spend them on, so maxed concentration is standard, plus a bit of Con. Throw in some focus and an item if you need the boost because you are often getting hit a lot (and you really shouldn't be). If you are making regular concentration checks, defensively or otherwise, you're doing it wrong.

That fighters and other straight melee classes lagged well behind casters (from mid levels on up) is not something that is open for debate. It is a problem that's long been mathematically established and acknowledged by the game designers. ToB was an effort to level the playing field a bit, and was quite successful at it, but it came out 7 years into the edition. (this is more in response to insanogeddon than Pain)

 

[Ourph]

Typically, if my foes do end up attacking the fighter, it is more because the spellcasters have done such a good job of protecting themselves/keeping themselves out of harm that the fighter then becomes a more enticing target by comparison, and less of the fighter doing such a stellar job of tanking.

That was my experience as well, both as a DM and when playing an arcane caster.

 

[Storminator]

Seen the recent OotS? Up to Familicide, I recognize everything V does. Just looks like ordinary high level wizardry.

What would Roy do if he were standing next to V during that sequence?

PS

 

[nightwyrm]

Seen the recent OotS? Up to Familicide, I recognize everything V does. Just looks like ordinary high level wizardry.

What would Roy do if he were standing next to V during that sequence?

PS

Pray that there isn't a black dragon hidden somewhere in his family tree?

 

[Fanaelialae]

In the last 3.5 campaign I played in, the Wizard was effectively useless for the first two levels. Starting at third level, although he still needed the rest of us to act as a front-line some of the time, he was able to completely trivialize most encounters (usually using Web or Glitterdust).

Because we were a group of wandering adventurers, he often had all the time he needed between adventures to scribe scrolls. As a result, the rest of the party was increasingly marginalized as the game went on. It wasn't that we were useless per se, but more and more it became the wizard and his traveling band of helpers.

He was quite optimized, but he also held back unless he thought we needed the help. I've known the player a long time and he honestly wasn't trying to dominate. He even offered to retire the character if we felt that he was hogging the spotlight. But the rest of us like the player and honestly weren't certain we could get by without his character. He'd generally cast a single spell or two and then sit back and let the rest of us handle the clean-up.

He had an answer to everything. He solo'd a pair of golems (I forget what kind) using some kind of Deanimating Ray specifically made to tear apart golems (he'd made it a point to carry a few scrolls of that spell in particular since he knows that golems are caster killers) when he realized that the rest of us were ineffective against them. He had spells that ignored spell resistance for creatures with spell resistance, and an answer to just about everything in general.

After the campaign died, our DM admitted that he found the Wizard's ability to counter just about everything he could throw at us incredibly frustrating.

In all fairness, the Wizard was probably the most optimized member of the party. The others were a moderately optimized Paladin and Warlock, and (myself) a suboptimized Druid (I used shifter class power substitutions so I had no Wild Shape or Animal Companion, but I was still a Druid). It was definitely not an optimal situation, but it was what it was. We did have some fun times. Just my most recent experience.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

A wizard who can cast Magic Jar could singlehandedly destroy an almost unlimited number of giants (or any other poor will save giant beasts) with no danger to himself.

Yet another example of the wizard overshadowing everyone else.

DS

 

[pawsplay]

The other part of this, which I mentioned briefly earlier in the thread, is that playing a high level fighter in D&D starts to get kind of boring.

Roll attack, roll damage. Roll attack, roll damage. Yawn. There's not much strategy or tactics involved. If you're using one of the specialized maneuvers like grapple or something then you're probably specialized enough that you try to do it all the time. Spellcasters get to shuffle their spells and pick which to use, as well as often having a bigger choice of opponents (or allies) to target round-by-round.

That's a fair criticism... of AD&D. A Third Edition fighter is as complex, if not moreso, than a wizard, and that, I firmly believe, is one of two things that cause people to mislabel the fighter as suboptimal (the other is a lack of logistical and quality-of-life spells, which is not an issue unless you have no casters in the group). Point to another character who has can melee, attack at a range, use special combat maneuvers, or interpose themselves bodily against monsters with a good chance of living, all with a credible level of ability. Even clerics, who can generate some of the higher numbers in melee, would have to sacrifice in some area to outshine the fighter, and they could never have a similar selection of feats. A fighter can disarm a lich's wand, wade into nests of giant spiders with little fear of poison, shoot flying imps out of the sky, and fight a medusa blind-folded.

A well-played fighter is a dominant force. Furthermore, they can instantly fulfill any number of logistical functions with one or two levels of the base rogue or cleric classes, if that's your bag. But whereas they are often mischaracterized as a power class, a beater or meat shield, in fact they are a versatile class. They are the wizard to barbarian's sorcerer.

 

[MichaelSomething]

Any thought I would have on the matter is most likely already discussed. Therefore I'll just post a link over to The Logic Ninja's Guide to Wizards.

 

[Runestar]

Point to another character who has can melee, attack at a range, use special combat maneuvers, or interpose themselves bodily against monsters with a good chance of living, all with a credible level of ability.

Last time I checked, "credible" used in this context would suggest that the fighter can achieve them with a fair degree of success. I find that a tad hard to believe.

Let us first start with the much vaunted combat maneuvers he can perform.

Disarm - many MM monsters don't use weapons, or have natural attacks (which mitigate the drawback of losing their weapon). Not to mention that monsters tend to surpass you in terms of attack rolls (due to sheer amount of racial HD and high str scores) and size. Only use is if you want that balor's vorpal longsword (which is otherwise lost from its death throes).

Grapple - first problem is figuring out how it works (which is actually a blessing in disguise, grapple checks tend to skewed terribly in favour of your foes, not least because of size limitations). Once the DM figures it out, well...you will wish he hadn't.

Sunder - same problem with disarm. Many foes flat out don't need weapons to be effective, and you are just destroying your own loot.

Trip - still fairly decent, once you get past the size limitations, and that monsters again possess an innate advantage due to their typically superior str scores and size. That bab is not used in the equation is actually a feature, not a bug (since their bab will likely surpass yours).

In addition, these maneuvers tend to more effective when used against the fighter then when used by him (because of the reasons listed above). So the best option open to a fighter is still full-attack/move+attack.

Melee - there was never any question as to whether the fighter could dish out excellent damage in melee, so you will not find me disputing this.

Attack at range - this one is a little trickier. A fighter who goes 2-handed weapon fighting will typically pump str/con while dumping dex (since heavy armour has a low max dex bonus anyways), so his ranged attacks will not be as good as a dedicated archer. Nor can you afford to invest in the weapon-spec tree for 2 fighting styles, so ranged combat is for most part an afterthought (in that most fighters who focus on melee will still carry a bow around, and maybe spend 2-3 feats on rapid shot/manyshot).

Interposition - the smart fighters wait until the foes have been neutralized by the casters before falling back on their core competency - a steady, reusable source of direct damage. So staying power is less of an issue than you may think.

3e was a game that rewarded overwhelming specialization in a narrow field. If you want your fighter to do all of the aforementioned abilities, you will find that he cannot do any of them well. To excel, you need to choose one, trick it and then stick with it all the way.

 

[Gunpowder]

Edit: Curse you Runestar for ninjaing me on the fighter combat maneuver and doing them better.

The problem I see it stems from what I call "Uncle's Law"
If you have seen Jackie Chan Adventures you know the character Uncle and one of his favorite quotes.
"Jackieeeee, Magic must defeat magic"
and that's the root of the problem.

Magic is the sole mover and shaker of 3x. If you want to be big and bad you need to be able to cast magic or have the gold to spend on items to duplicate those spells. Ancient dragons aren't scary because they are ancient incarnations of the elements, its because they are 14 level sorcerers with lots of melee attacks. A warlord bent on world domination will get ganked while he is on the can if he doesn't have anti-scrying spells. A 20th level wizard is a power comparable to entire armies. A 20th level fighter, is a guy who makes 6 attacks a round but fortunetely has a lot of gold to spend on magic items to duplicate some of the abilites the wizard has innately.

A fighter buffed to the gills is truely a power house, but that's because he's buffed to the gills. The same effect could have been achieved by buffing a NPC warrior or the druid's ape. Hell you may be able to do better buffing the ape since they have a natural 10 ft reach (don't need to waste a slot on enlarge person).

Seriously, if a fighter is shining in an encounter, its due to one of two things.
1. Lots of spells/gold has been poured into him and the ass kicking is the sum result of the spellcastor's efforts. or
2. Everyone else has been handicapped so badly, that they are brought down to the fighters level (anti-magic zone, creature immunties etc)

One more thing
Pawsplay
Fighters are complex because you need to know ahead of time which feats you need to take with the bonus feats before you multi-class/prestige class into an a class that has actual abilites.

what special combat manuevers?
Trip is good. In fact, the spike chained trip spammer is the only fighter build capable of any sort of control. Control that starts failing as soon as the enemies start: flying(with spells, creatures with wings can be tripped), being bigger(unless the fighter gets enlarge person on him which cancels the benefit of being large, but falls behind against huge and up), stronger ( bull's strength can only go so far) or has more legs.

Bull rushing: yeah for giving up damage so a small push effect that hits the same road blocks as trip (bigger, stronger, immunties)

Disarm: Most higher CR monsters dont use weapons unless you are appling class levels to humanoids, which works unless they are a spell castor then they don't care.

Grapple: Once again creatures bigger, stronger than you want to grapple you and unless you jump around getting: feats, perstige classes and magic to boost your grapple modifier you are getting owned. Also freedom of movement counters grapple automatically. Have a +100 to grapple. I don't care, with FOM I walk out automatically.

Interposing:
huzzah I get to be a speed bump. and if i sacrifice my standard action I can ready an action to move when the bad guy moves, and then they use their reach to punch the wizard in the face any ways.

Clerics need one spell to equal fighters: Divine power. Nets you fighter BAB. the +6 to strength, and temporary hit points are just gravy. That's not even including level one spell divine favor(bonus to hit that stacks with everything else) or righteous fury (its enlarge person on high octane crack)
Sure you have some fewer feats but all you need is power attack to mix it up in melee. And if somehow that's not cutting it in melee. CONGRATS you are still a primary castor so five foot step and blast away.

One other thing

liches
Wands are just spell batteries. The lich would prefer a disarm than getting PA'ed in the face for 2d6+100 (Lich: man I hope he rolls low).

Poison
High fort saves can still fail. Neutrailze poison works 100% or delay poison makes poison a none-issue for the fight as least.
Imps
Hope he has good aligned arrows. He can't power attack to get through the DR. Maybe he has enough pluses on the bow to counter that though.

Medusa
I assume you say this because, fighters can pick up blind-fight right? Well anyone can do that as well, its not fighter specific. Just cast spells that dont require attack roles, evard's should work well, or that blocks line of sight. solid fog+stinking/acid cloud.

In conclusion,
Fighters are a verstile class because you don't lose anything by multiclass/presitge class out of it. You dip in for two levels(maybe 4 for weapon spec) for the feats, then get a class with actual abilites.